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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20260214T140000
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SUMMARY:Humanism   2/14/26
DESCRIPTION:  \nHUMANISM \n  \nJohnny Stallings will host a dialogue on Humanism on Saturday\, February 14th\, 2026\, at 2 pm (PST).  \nHere’s the Zoom link: \n  \nhttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/82751789337 \n  \n  \n  \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/humanism/
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20260122
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20260202
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20260122T200705Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260122T201603Z
UID:6032-1769040000-1769990399@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:An Sceal (The Story) with Will Hornyak
DESCRIPTION:  \nThe Open Road Recommends:  \n  \nAn Sceal (The Story) Will Hornyak joins Portland’s brilliant Corrib Theatre folks to celebrate St. Brigit and Imbolc with dance\, drama\, singing & storytelling. \nThursday\, January 22\,  1 pm \nSunday\, January 25\,  8:30 pm \nThursday\, January 29\,  1 pm \nSunday\, February 1\,  8:30 pm \nT.C. O’Leary’s Pub\, 2926 NE Alberta\, in Portland  \nTickets & info: https://www.corribtheatre.org/tickets \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/an-sceal-the-story-with-will-hornyak/
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20260117T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20260117T160000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251222T010722Z
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SUMMARY:ZEN: History & Essence  1/17/26
DESCRIPTION:  \nZEN:History & Essence \n  \nJohnny Stallings will give an overview of the history of Zen and host a conversation about the meaning of Zen on Saturday\, January 17th\, 2026\, at 2 pm (PST).  \nHere’s the Zoom link: \n  \nhttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/88465906598 \n  \n  \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/zen-history-essence-1-17-26/
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20260101
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20260205
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20260101T204209Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260101T205613Z
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SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  1/1/26
DESCRIPTION:photo by Abe Green \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nJanuary 1\, 2026 \n  \nthe Dalai Lama has a busy day today \nhe has to remind everybody \nto be kind to each other \n  \nF. O. Matthiessen coined the phrase “American Renaissance” in his 1941 book with that title. He was referring to the period between 1850 and 1855\, which saw the publication of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Representative Men\, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter\, Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick\, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin\, Henry David Thoreau’s Walden and Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself. \n  \nI’ve been thinking about the period between 1955 and the present as a “Second American Renaissance.” By an amazing coincidence this period coincides nicely with my own life. I was born in 1951. I’m using the term “renaissance” loosely to mean an exciting time of transformation and new ideas. \n  \nThough Mathiessen’s American Renaissance was short-lived\, like the Italian Renaissance\, it sowed seeds that continued to sprout everywhere. The Italian Renaissance lasted approximately 200 years\, from 1400 to 1600. This Second American Renaissance\, now about 70 years old\, is still going strong. \n  \nWhen I think of the Italian Renaissance\, the first people who come to mind are artists: Michelangelo\, Da Vinci\, Raphael\, Botticelli. But there was more to it than painting. There were the Borgias and Medicis\, Machiavelli\, Petrarch\, Galileo and Columbus. In the same way\, the Second American Renaissance contains all kinds of big ideas and important changes. \n  \nHere are some of the Big Things that have happened: \n  \nCivil Rights Movement\, Environmental Movement\, Peace Movement\, Women’s Liberation\, Gay Liberation\, Humanistic Psychology and the Human Potential Movement\, Eastern Influences: Meditation\, Mindfulness\, Yoga & Zen\, Rock & Roll\, Trip to the Moon\, Whole Earth Catalog\, (return to) Organic Agriculture\, vegan & vegetarian diets\, advances in medical technology\, computers\, cell phones—and a Knowledge Explosion. \n  \nAnd something I’m going to call the “evolution of consciousness.” I am going to put forward the crazy idea that there is even an evolution of love and of peace and of happiness and of wisdom. Sounds New-Agey\, doesn’t it? And the reason is simple: this is a New Age. There was a certain feeling that many of us had between 1968 and 1972 that a Big Change was underway. We were right. \n  \nDuring a “renaissance\,” not everything is groovy. Michelangelo and Da Vinci were rare birds. Not everyone who was living in what we now call “Italy” between 1400 and 1600 were actively remaking the world. The popes and political leaders were horrible people! There was lots of senseless warfare going on—not to mention plagues! So it wasn’t a particularly happy time. But\, as in Periclean Athens\, things were happening in the human imagination that changed the potential of what it means to be a human being. \n  \nThat’s what I mean by the phrase “evolution of consciousness.” In one way\, consciousness\, or awareness never changes. Like Life (with a capital “L”) it just is what it is. But human potential—for understanding and for loving—can change and does change\, both for individuals and for cultures. As Heraclitus and the Buddhists say: everything is always changing. \n  \nEach of our lives is full of possibilities! Let’s make the most of them in the New Year! \n  \n—Johnny Stallings \n* \n  \nDriven to Exclaim \n  \nHow can I be so happy! \nThere’s so much bad news! \nInside\, my heart is crying! But \noutside\, the crows are shouting! \nDon’t they heed bad news—ruffians! \nHard times are coming! Hard times \nare here! Everywhere I look\, pain! \nWhy are leaders such angry children! \nI’m such a child I want to stay up \nlate loving the ruined world! \nEven the crows are shouting \nstrange joy! All I can do is crow! \n  \n—Kim Stafford\, Winter Solstice 2025 \n* \n  \nThe Robin and You \n  \nExtravagant in praise he bows to her. \nTells her she is a falcon-ness\, a phoenix \nand in his quiet moments a swan. \n  \nShe knows she is a plain woods robin \nand what matters is her song. \nEarly before the worms\, she practices her art. \n  \nHer flash of red breast a surprise \nonly to those who have no feel for the natural world. \nWrapped inside themselves\, amidst their suffering \n  \nshe sings for them. \nHer beak is the vessel\, her mate the morning dew. \nHer only audience\, the wise and patient yew. \n  \n—Elizabeth Domike \n* \n  \nThere is still magic in the world\, whether it be natural or man-made. \n  \nAcross the Columbia River from Hood River is White Salmon\, Washington. Every year in early December members of the White Salmon Chamber of Commerce climb in their cherry picker vehicles and head out to Dock Grade\, a half-mile\, one- way road that travels from Highway 14 up the hill to White Salmon. They are laden with close to a thousand Christmas ornaments\, huge ornamental balls and stars to hang in the trees overhanging the road. The ornaments can be 8”-10” in diameter\, and they are suspended 10’ to 30’ up in the bare-limbed trees. You drive up the road and are surrounded by a thousand floating orbs\, spheres\, globes and stars. It feels like you’re floating through space in a spaceship\, with celestial elements surrounding you\, enveloping you. Sunlight shines down and lights each ornament from above. It’s a feeling of magic. The kind of feeling you normally lose as you grow up and become “too old” for magic. \n  \nBut there’s the natural magic—the magic of nature. A terrible wildfire (one of many!) swept through Catherine Creek\, a wildflower lover’s mecca\, and left the entire area blackened\, crushed\, destroyed\, last summer. A friend has been working on restoration there and she told me to head out and take a look—“Just go!” she said. So after the drive up Dock Grade I drove the ten miles out to Catherine Creek and started tromping around: charred\, blackened tree trunks and limbs\, and shrubs nothing more than crusty twigs. Heartbreaking. What am I doing out here??!!? But! I  look down and I  see thousands of tiny blades of green grasses\, and atop many of them\, the soft purple blossoms of the grass widows: the first wildflowers of spring! In bloom! In December!. They hardly ever appear before late February or early March. People make the trek out to Catherine Creek just to see the grass widows in March\, knowing that blossoms mean spring! But here they are\, nodding up at me\, saying\, Yep\, the fires of summer gave us a jumpstart. Thought you’d like that. Like???!!! I love it! The magic of nature. The magic of life. \n  \nAnd this was all in just one day! \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \n“Know that you are a child of the universe.” \n—Yogi tea bag wisdom \n  \nMusings on a Winter sunny day… \n   \nWhen Winter comes in cold and bright\, after days of rain that have turned Summer’s brown grasses back to green\, I think\, “Oh no\, Spring is coming too soon.” I love the long winter dark\, which is my excuse for reading and being cozy under quilts even in the daytime\, and by the wood stove in the evenings.   \n  \nHere it is New Year’s Eve and Spring is in the air\, coming up all around us in Autumn’s left over leaves—crocuses\, scilla\, hyacinth\, a first pink camellia in bloom\, daphne budding out.  \n  \nThoreau wrote of this wonder in Walden\, about the ponds in Winter\, the first crack of the ice signifying Spring has begun. Frozen ponds are rare in the Northwest\, and snow in the mountains is a month late\, but we have subtle signs. Even in my body that wants to hibernate\, I also want to go out looking for sprouts and buds\, returning birds and bunnies.   \n  \nRecently I read about Thoreau’s extraordinary Kalendar. He had a daily habit of walking and noting what was happening through the season in his Nature neighborhood. His Journal is the record of these practices\, and the Kalendar is their culminating gesture: the final major endeavor of his life.  \n  \nThe charts of general phenomena derived from Thoreau’s long-held sense that ‘our thoughts & sentiments answer to the revolution of the seasons\,’ and his equally long-standing desire to more fully experience and comprehend the complex network of relations—what we would now call the ecosystem—of which he knew himself to be a part. Though Thoreau had for many years been keeping lists and charts of individual observations of the natural world—bird migration times\, the flowering and leafing out of trees—the Kalendar was a discovery: a crystallization of his long-developing ideas about time\, the natural world\, and the nature of perception.” \n  \nReading through this makes me aware of how extraordinary it is to be alive\, to be here at all at such a blip in the planet’s life. I also see this wonder in my puppy’s exploration of Nature. Being a Border Collie\, she is dumbfounded by the squirrels that run up trees\, and by birds and even airplanes in the sky—because these are moving things she cannot herd. She at least has chickens and rabbits and a giant Golden Retriever who visits on weekends. Then there is my granddaughter’s wonder at everything new—mushrooms coming out of the ground in leaves that have turned red!! \n  \nSo\, thank goodness for the seasons that return on their own timeline with no prompting from us. Hopefully we all fall in love with the magic of life and finally save as much as we can for the children and creatures coming along. \n  \nHere is a poem from my friend Barbara\, a gardener and a writer: \n  \nWinter Solstice \n  \nThe long nights recede \nAs the light slowly returns \nAnd my heart lifts up \nStars in the night sky \nYield to an early sunrise\, \nPink and orange sky \nAnd evenings stretch out; \nThe light lingers longer now\, \nWarming the new buds \nI come more alive: \nThe light feeds my hungry soul\, \nStarving for beauty. \nMore revealed each hour\, \nLeaves\, buds\, flowers greet the day \nAs the sun warms them \nWelcome light’s return \nOur gift for surviving the \nDark\, cold winter nights. \n  \n—Barbara Blossom \n  \nSpeaking of watching the wild\, here is a funny aside from Gina Wilson\, who sent this: \n  \nGayle Highpine writes in her book on making friends with wild birds: \n  \n“To survive among us\, they (birds) have to watch what we are doing\, and we are odd and different from the other ground creatures they see. Cows and squirrels and cats and deer are understandable\, and predictable. If you see enough cows\, you have a good idea what to expect from any cow you see. But humans are different. They do different things—sometimes humans do things that nobody’s ever seen. Sometimes a human may change its clothing overnight and yet it is the same human.” \n     \nGina wrote:  Never thought about how we change our “skin”—often numerous times a day! \n  \n—Katie Radditz
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-1-1-26/
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END:VEVENT
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20251214T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20251214T160000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251208T043559Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251211T023340Z
UID:5955-1765720800-1765728000@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:The Second American Renaissance
DESCRIPTION:  \nTHE SECOND AMERICAN RENAISSANCE \n(1955-2025) \n  \nan entertainment by Johnny Stallings  \nSunday\, December 14th\, 2 pm \nLibrary at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \n  \nthis Open Road event is free
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/the-second-american-renaissance/
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20251204
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20260101
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251211T024742Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251211T025624Z
UID:5963-1764806400-1767225599@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  12/4/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nDecember 4\, 2025 \n  \nKim Stafford shared this poem by David Budbill: \n  \nSometimes \n  \nSometimes when day after day we have cloudless blue skies\,\nwarm temperatures\, colorful trees and brilliant sun\, when\nit seems like all this will go on forever\, \n  \nwhen I harvest vegetables from the garden all day\,\nthen drink tea and doze in the late afternoon sun\,\nand in the evening one night make pickled beets\nand green tomato chutney\, the next red tomato chutney\,\nand the day after that pick the fruits of my arbor\nand make grape jam\, \n  \nwhen we walk in the woods every evening over fallen leaves\,\nthrough yellow light\, when nights are cool\, and days warm\, \n  \nwhen I am so happy I am afraid I might explode or disappear\nor somehow be taken away from all this\, \n  \nat those times when I feel so happy\, so good\, so alive\, so in love\nwith the world\, with my own sensuous\, beautiful life\, suddenly \n  \nI think about all the suffering and pain in the world\, the agony\nand dying. I think about all those people being tortured\, right now\,\nin my name. But I still feel happy and good\, alive and in love with\nthe world and with my lucky\, guilty\, sensuous\, beautiful life because\, \n  \nI know in the next minute or tomorrow all this may be\ntaken from me\, and therefore I’ve got to say\, right now\,\nwhat I feel and know and see\, I’ve got to say\, right now\,\nhow beautiful and sweet this world can be. \n  \n—David Budbill \n* \n  \nFrom “The Marginalian\,” an online journal: \n  \nHere we are\, living these lives bright and perishable as a poppy\, hard and shimmering as obsidian. We know that they are entirely improbable\, that we bless that bright improbability with each flash of gratitude for it all\, that if we pay attention closely and generously enough we are always repaid in gladness\, that it is the handle of the door to the world. And yet over and over we choose to live in the cage of complaint\, too preoccupied with how the will of life betrayed our wishes\, the wanting monster always growling in the other corner of the cage. \n  \nImagine parting the bars and stepping out. Imagine waking up with a rush of gladness at everything we were never promised but got anyway — trees and music\, clouds and consciousness\, the cobalt eye of the scallop\, the golden fan of the gingko\, the alabaster chandelier of the ghost pipe. \n  \nIn our age of competitive prostration\, this is a headstand hard to hold for long. But it is trainable. It is possible to become strong enough to be tender\, it is. \n  \n—Maria Popova\, editor of “The Marginalian\,” November 23\, 2025 \n* \n  \nI’ve been keeping a journal more-or-less daily for 55 years. Sometimes it’s fun to revisit things I’ve written. This is from last Spring: \n  \nfriday\, april 25th\, 2025 \n  \nthe conventional way of looking at perfect moments is that they happen once in a while \nthey’re brief \nand then they’re gone \nand we’re back to boring everyday humdrum life \nbut it’s possible to experience perfect moments as having nothing to do with time \nthey don’t have a beginning or end \nyou could say they last a lifetime—or that they are a lifetime \nthe beauty of humans overwhelms me!!!!!!! \nit’s getting ridiculous! \ni don’t know what to do with it\, or how to communicate it \n  \nsaturday\, april 26th\, 2025 \n  \nyesterday\, i watched “the accountant 2” at the laurelhurst theater\, from 4 to 6 \nit was a beautiful sunny spring day \nafter two hours in a dark theater\, under the spell of a movie\, when you come out and it’s still daytime\, the sunshine seems brighter and everything more vivid and somehow more real \nyou’ve been immersed in an imaginary reality—under its spell—and now you’re in the actual world \nas i walked by the crema coffee house and the moon shot tavern\, lots of people were outside at picnic tables \nit’s friday\, they’ve just gotten off work\, the sun is shining and they’re in a good mood \na little girl of about 4 or 5 is running down the sidewalk toward me \nshe’s laughing as she runs \nshe’s the happiest person on earth \nher happiness goes right into me \npassing a food cart area\, there are lots more people at picnic tables \nand the sound they are making together is a joyous one \nand i have a feeling which is also a thought that people are so beautiful! \nand then the thought that moments don’t have boundaries \nalthough we are accustomed to thinking that they do \nand thinking that they are short \nand that perfect moments are infrequent\, and then quickly gone \nbut they’re not gone \njohn keats said \na thing of beauty is a joy for ever \nmaybe a reason that this quote became famous is because it expresses a deeper truth than mr. gradgrind’s facts: \n  \nChapter 1 \nThe One Thing Needful \n‘Now\, what I want is\, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else\, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children\, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to Facts\, Sir!’ \n  \n—Gradgrind\, the schoolmaster\, from the opening of Hard Times by Charles Dickens \n  \nthe way I was seeing and feeling and being when the little girl was laughing and running toward me and people nearby were in a glorious mood—that way of seeing and feeling and being is truer for me than the feeling i have when i’m reading the new york times \nin those boundaryless moments i’m alive! \n  \nthich nhat hanh says you can spend your whole life in a kind of exile from the present moment and miss your life entirely \nif you died and went to the pearly gates\, they’d look in the book and see that you haven’t lived yet—and send you back for another try \n  \nscientific and rational ways of knowing are not bad \nand they leave things out\, like imagination\, love\, beauty and meaning \n  \nto see a world in a grain of sand \nand a heaven in a wild flower \n  \na thing of beauty is a joy for ever \n  \n(maybe those romantic poets gave me a blessing) \n(maybe they changed the way i see and feel and experience the world) \n  \nif the sight of a tulip or a hummingbird goes into you deeply enough\, it does something to you \nit changes you \n  \nmy primary felt experience is that i am living in Paradise \n  \n—Johnny Stallings \n* \n  \nEarth Born Creatures \n  \nThe gravel parking lot smells \nlike oil\, the trash strewn woods \nback up the roadhouse to the creek. \n  \nA boxy banana-colored car \nrusts there\, sags a bit in \nchangeable late afternoon light. \n  \nThe long-waisted girl in torn jeans \npauses over her broom. Fantasy \nburns through her\, leaves a tired ache \n  \nfor pretty things\, clean lines\, shine. \nShe looks at her hands \nHer fingers not quite straight \n  \ncaught that way in the womb \nthey remind her that she is subject \nto time and accidents of fate. \n  \nA scrawny tabby steps out of shadow\, \nprimly wraps his tail round his feet. \nThey stare at each other. The girl blinks \n  \nthinks of comfort and laughs. \nThe cat imagines cornering mice. \nAn owl awakens hungry back in the trees. \n  \n—Elizabeth Domike \n* \n  \nHere are a couple of excerpts from two of Rocky’s many letters: \n  \nNovember 11\, 2025 \n4 a.m. \nDear Johnny & Nancy \n  \nWe all got the day off in here due to the holidays. We have a lot of holidays this month. Soon the year will be over\, too. I’ve been looking back a little in time & knowing 17 years is quite a long time\, it seems like it was…only a few days ago that I came into D.O.C. custody! I think it’s because time\, in our minds\, moves differently. In our minds we can slow it down\, or\, speed it up. We could freeze it as well\, if we wanted to. \n  \nIt’s a sad reality to think that I’ve spent ⅓ of the life I’ve been given this time around as a prisoner. I know that I deserved to serve this time. Without my life in here I would not be who I am now. That would not be good\, because I would never have met the people in my life that I love & who help make me who I am. I would never have gotten to become the man I am today. That thought just gave me chills. Those seeds of wild emotions—Empathy\, Joy\, Kindness\, Love\, Wonder\, Humility—that were scattered upon my heart\, mind & soul\, like someone scattering handfuls of wildflower seeds on a hillside is what grows inside of me. You two had a hand in scattering those seeds. I believe we each\, in our own ways\, help each other’s hearts to grow & heal in all sorts of ways….. \n  \nNovember 12\, 2025 \n4:27 a.m. \nWe had a conversation on the phone yesterday afternoon. It was nice to talk about many different things. We had talked a few days before about that! It’s easy to talk about release from prison under the circumstances. \n  \nOne of the things that stuck out to me was the peace that I get from waking up early in here. It truly is the only quiet time of the day. What I’ve been thinking about is that Kim Stafford does that & his dad did too. The fact to me that really rang a bell was how he came by doing it. He started doing it in a prison camp! \n  \nPrison is not a place where most can find or have a second of peace\, most are overwhelmed by frustrations\, sadness\, hopelessness and misery. All those emotions & vibes come off of them & touch and trigger emotions in others\, even reaching the staff sometimes.  I found that if I start my day as early as I can & meditate in my writing\, do my letters to home & do my school work\, my days are most of the time started on the Golden Path. Everyone is still sleeping and none of the negativity is in the air. I love starting my days off before the world comes to life…. \n  \nAlways planting good seeds in the World\, \nRocky \n—Rocky Hutchinson
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-12-4-25/
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END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20251204
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20251208
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251203T191245Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251203T191534Z
UID:5948-1764806400-1765151999@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:King Lear
DESCRIPTION:  \nOur friend Allen Mills is producing this show.  \n  \nCatch it if you can!   \n  \nClick here to reserve tickets:  \n  \n https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19NeFfGPne/ \n  \npeace & love   \n  \nJohnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/king-lear/
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END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20251115T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20251115T160000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251025T222816Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251025T222948Z
UID:5898-1763215200-1763222400@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:JOURNEYS: Stories of Immigrants & Refugees
DESCRIPTION:  \nJOURNEYS \n  \nstories of immigrants & refugees  \nwith Johnny Stallings & friends \n  \nSaturday\, November 15th\, 2 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \n  \nthis Open Road event is free \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/journeys-stories-of-immigrants-refugees/
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END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20251103
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20251204
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251103T203811Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251103T215549Z
UID:5922-1762128000-1764806399@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  11/6/25
DESCRIPTION:The Good Samaritan by Vincent Van Gogh \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nNovember 6\, 2025 \n  \nThe Stories We Tell Ourselves \n  \nThese are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands\, they are not original with me\, \nIf they are not yours as much as mind\, they are nothing… \n  \n—Walt Whitman\, from “Song of Myself” \n* \n  \nA man is what he thinks about all day long. \n  \n—Ralph Waldo Emerson \n* \n  \nWe are what we think. \nAll that we are arises with our thoughts. \nWith our thoughts we make the world. \n  \n—Buddha\, from Dhammapada \n* \n  \nethnosphere: “the sum total of all thoughts\, beliefs\, myths and institutions made manifest today by the myriad cultures of the world.” \n  \n–Wade Davis\, from Light at the Edge of the World\, p. x \n* \n  \nMortals suppose that the gods are born\, and wear clothes\, and have voice and form like themselves. \n  \nBut if cattle and lions had hands\, and could paint with their hands\, and fashion images\, as men do\, they would make pictures of their gods in their own likeness; horses would make them like horses\, cattle like cattle.             \n  \n—Xenophanes (570-478 B.C.) \n* \n  \nI…peruse manifold objects\, no two alike and every one good\,  \nThe earth good and the stars good\, and their adjuncts all good.  \n  \n—Walt Whitman\, from “Song of Myself” \n* \n  \n…this our life\, exempt from public haunt\, \nFinds tongues in trees\, books in the running brooks\, \nSermons in stones\, and good in every thing. \n  \n—Duke Senior in Shakespeare’s As You Like It\, Act 2\, scene 1 \n* \n  \nI believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. (Nobel Prize speech\, 1964) \n  \nI have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear. \n  \nHate paralyzes life; love releases it. Hate confuses life; love harmonizes it. \n  \nI know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind’s problems. \n  \n—Martin Luther King \n* \n  \nwhat we think is who we are \nas indivduals \nand collectively \n  \nFor more than twenty years\, i’ve been turning this phrase over in my mind:  \n  \nthe stories we tell ourselves \n  \nI’m fascinated by how each of us constructs an identity and a worldview—stories about who we are and about the world and our relationship to it. Each of the things I’ve chosen for this “peace\, love\, happiness & understanding” suggests a story—a way of experiencing or understanding our life. My own felt sense of things is that Johnny Stallings is a fictional character\, and from moment to moment I’m dreaming the world in which I live. \n* \n  \nA Story that Could be True \n  \nIf you were exchanged in the cradle and\nyour real mother died\nwithout ever telling the story\nthen no one knows your name\,\nand somewhere in the world\nyour father is lost and needs you\nbut you are far away. \nHe can never find\nhow true you are\, how ready.\nWhen the great wind comes\nand the robberies of the rain\nyou stand on the corner shivering.\nThe people who go by—\nyou wonder at their calm. \nThey miss the whisper that runs\nany day in your mind\,\n“Who are you really\, wanderer?”—\nand the answer you have to give\nno matter how dark and cold\nthe world around you is:\n“Maybe I’m a king.” \n  \n—William Stafford \n* \nThe parable of the good samaritan: \n  \n25 And\, behold\, a certain lawyer stood up\, and tempted him\, saying\, Master\, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? \n26 He said unto him\, What is written in the law? how readest thou? \n27 And he answering said\, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart\, and with all thy soul\, and with all thy strength\, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. \n28 And he said unto him\, Thou hast answered right: this do\, and thou shalt live. \n29 But he\, willing to justify himself\, said unto Jesus\, And who is my neighbour? \n30 And Jesus answering said\, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho\, and fell among thieves\, which stripped him of his raiment\, and wounded him\, and departed\, leaving him half dead. \n31 And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him\, he passed by on the other side. \n32 And likewise a Levite\, when he was at the place\, came and looked on him\, and passed by on the other side. \n33 But a certain Samaritan\, as he journeyed\, came where he was: and when he saw him\, he had compassion on him\, \n34 And went to him\, and bound up his wounds\, pouring in oil and wine\, and set him on his own beast\, and brought him to an inn\, and took care of him. \n35 And on the morrow when he departed\, he took out two pence\, and gave them to the host\, and said unto him\, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more\, when I come again\, I will repay thee. \n36 Which now of these three\, thinkest thou\, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? \n37 And he said\, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him\, Go\, and do thou likewise. \n  \n—Luke 10:25-37  (KJV) \n* \nHere’s a more recent version of the same story\, by E. E. Cummings: \n  \na man who had fallen among thieves\nlay by the roadside on his back\ndressed in fifteenthrate ideas\nwearing a round jeer for a hat \nfate per a somewhat more than less\nemancipated evening\nhad in return for consciousness\nendowed him with a changeless grin \nwhereon a dozen staunch and leal\ncitizens did graze at pause\nthen fired by hypercivic zeal\nsought newer pastures or because \nswaddled with a frozen brook\nof pinkest vomit out of eyes\nwhich noticed nobody he looked\nas if he did not care to rise \none hand did nothing on the vest\nits wideflung friend clenched weakly dirt\nwhile the mute trouserfly confessed\na button solemnly inert \nBrushing from whom the stiffened puke\ni put him all into my arms\nand staggered banged with terror through\na million billion trillion stars \n  \n—e. e. cummings \n* \nThis is an old folktale: \n  \nThe Shirt of a Happy Man \n  \nOnce there was a king who wanted to be happy. His wise counselors informed him that he needed to acquire the shirt of a happy man. So\, he sent his soldiers out in quest of such a shirt. One by one they returned empty-handed. None of them could find a happy man. Finally\, the last soldier returned.  \n  \nThe king asked\, “Did you find a happy man?”  \n  \n“Yes\,” the soldier said.  \n  \n“Where’s his shirt?\,” asked the king.  \n  \n“He didn’t have one.” \n* \n  \nCheck out the Playing for Change version of “Peace Train” by Yusuf/Cat Stevens on YouTube! \n  \n* \nMy dad liked this poem: \n  \nAbou Ben Adhem \n  \nAbou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!) \nAwoke one night from a deep dream of peace\, \nAnd saw\, within the moonlight in his room\, \nMaking it rich\, and like a lily in bloom\, \nAn angel writing in a book of gold:— \nExceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold\, \nAnd to the presence in the room he said\, \n“What writest thou?”—The vision raised its head\, \nAnd with a look made of all sweet accord\, \nAnswered\, “The names of those who love the Lord.” \n“And is mine one?” said Abou. “Nay\, not so\,” \nReplied the angel. Abou spoke more low\, \nBut cheerly still; and said\, “I pray thee\, then\, \nWrite me as one that loves his fellow men.” \n  \nThe angel wrote\, and vanished. The next night \nIt came again with a great wakening light\, \nAnd showed the names whom love of God had blest\, \nAnd lo! Ben Adhem’s name led all the rest. \n  \n—Leigh Hunt \n* \n  \nPlato told this story: \n  \nSome people are in a cave. They are chained up in such a way that they can’t move\, and can’t turn their heads. They are all looking straight ahead.  \n  \nBehind them are people with torches who are carrying things back and forth and talking to each other. The cave-dwellers see shadows on the wall in front of them—their own shadows and the shadows of the objects that are being carried back and forth. As far as they know\, the only reality is these shadows and the conversations that the shadows appear to be having with each other. \n  \nOne man escapes from his bondage and is able to turn around and see what’s going on in the cave. Then he leaves the cave and sees the sun illuminating an amazing world. \n  \nHe wants to tell the people in the cave about what he has seen and understood. He goes back down into the cave. When he tries to tell the people what he has seen\, they think he is mad. \n* \n  \nHere’s one from William Blake: \n  \nThe Garden of Love \n  \nI went to the Garden of Love\, \nAnd saw what I never had seen: \nA Chapel was built in the midst\, \nWhere I used to play on the green. \n  \nAnd the gates of this Chapel were shut\, \nAnd ‘Thou shalt not’ writ over the door; \nSo I turn’d to the Garden of Love\, \nThat so many sweet flowers bore.  \n  \nAnd I saw it was filled with graves\, \nAnd tomb-stones where flowers should be: \nAnd Priests in black gowns\, were walking their rounds\, \nAnd binding with briars\, my joys & desires. \n  \n—William Blake \n* \n  \nThese are a few or my favorite passages from my favorite poem\, Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself: \n  \n20 \n…Why should I pray?  Why should I venerate and be ceremonious? \n  \nHaving pried through the strata\, analyzed to a hair\, counseled with doctors and calculated close\, \nI find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones. \n  \nIn all people I see myself\, none more and not one a barley-corn less… \n  \n24 \n…I believe in the flesh and the appetites\, \nSeeing\, hearing\, feeling\, are miracles\, and each part and tag of me is a miracle. \n  \nDivine am I inside and out\, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touched from\, \nThe scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer\, \nThis head more than churches\, bibles\, and all the creeds…. \n  \nEach moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy…. \n  \nA morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books. \n  \n30 \nAll truths wait in all things… \n  \n31 \nI believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars\, \nAnd the ant is equally perfect\, and a grain of sand\, and the egg of the wren\, \nAnd the tree-toad is a masterpiece for the highest\, \nAnd the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven\, \nAnd the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery\, \nAnd the cow crunching with depressed head surpasses any statue\, \nAnd a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels. \n  \n44 \nImmense have been the preparations for me…. \n  \nCycles ferried my cradle\, rowing and rowing like cheerful boatmen\, \nFor room to me stars kept aside in their own rings\, \nThey sent influences to look after what was to hold me. \n  \nBefore I was born out of my mother generations guided me\, \nMy embryo has never been torpid\, nothing could overlay it. \n  \nFor it the nebula cohered to an orb\, \nThe long slow strata piled to rest it on\, \nVast vegetables gave it sustenance\, \nMonstrous sauroids transported it in their mouths and deposited it with care. \n  \nAll forces have been steadily employed to complete and delight me\, \nNow on this spot I stand with my robust soul. \n  \n48 \n…whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud… \nAnd to glance with an eye or show a bean in its pod confounds the learning of all times… \nAnd there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe…. \n  \nWhy should I wish to see God better than this day? \nI see something of God each hour of the twenty-four\, and each moment then\, \nIn the faces of men and women I see God\, and in my own face in the glass\, \nI find letters from God dropt in the street\, and every one is signed by God’s name\, \nAnd I leave them where they are\, for I know that wheresoe’er I go \nOthers will punctually come for ever and ever. \n  \n—Walt Whitman \n* \n  \nThomas Traherne was a Seventeenth Century Christian mystic. I love his ecstatic poems and meditations! In this meditation he is writing about how he experienced the world as a small child: \n  \nThe corn was orient and immortal wheat\, which never should be reaped\, nor was ever sown. I thought it had stood from everlasting to everlasting. The dust and stones of the street were as precious as gold: the gates were at first the end of the world. The green trees when I saw them first through one of the gates transported and ravished me\, their sweetness and unusual beauty made my heart to leap\, and almost mad with ecstasy\, they were such strange and wonderful things. The Men! O what venerable and reverend creatures did the aged seem! Immortal Cherubims! And young men glittering and sparkling Angels\, and maids strange seraphic pieces of life and beauty! Boys and girls tumbling in the street\, and playing\, were moving jewels. I knew not that they were born or should die; But all things abided eternally as they were in their proper places. Eternity was manifest in the Light of the Day\, and something infinite behind everything appeared: which talked with my expectation and moved my desire. The city seemed to stand in Eden\, or to be built in Heaven. The streets were mine\, the temple was mine\, the people were mine\, their clothes and gold and silver were mine\, as much as their sparkling eyes\, fair skins and ruddy faces. The skies were mine\, and so were the sun and moon and stars\, and all the World was mine; and I the only spectator and enjoyer of it. I knew no churlish proprieties\, nor bounds\, nor divisions: but all proprieties and divisions were mine: all treasures and the possessors of them. So that with much ado I was corrupted\, and made to learn the dirty devices of this world. Which now I unlearn\, and become\, as it were\, a little child again that I may enter into the Kingdom of God. \n  \n—Thomas Traherne\, from Centuries of Meditations \n* \n  \nIn Dostoevsky’s great last novel\, The Brother’s Karamazov\, there is a monk named Father Zossima. When I first read the novel\, fifty years ago\, I was impressed with the words of Father Zossima\, which are of course Dostoevsky’s words: \n  \nBrothers\, do not be afraid of men’s sin\, love man also in his sin\, for this likeness of God’s love is the height of love on earth. Love all of God’s creation\, both the whole of it and every grain of sand. Love every leaf\, every ray of God’s light. Love animals\, love plants\, love each thing. If you love each thing\, you will perceive the mystery of God in things. Once you have perceived it\, you will begin tirelessly to perceive more and more of it every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an entire\, universal love…. \n  \nMy friends\, ask joy from God. Be joyful as children\, as birds in the air…. \n  \nWhen you are alone\, pray. Love to throw yourself down on the earth and kiss it. Kiss the earth and love it\, tirelessly\, insatiably\, love all men\, love all things\, seek this rapture and ecstasy. Water the earth with the tears of your joy\, and love those tears. Do not be ashamed of this ecstasy\, treasure it\, for it is a gift from God\, a great gift\, and it is not given to many\, but to those who are chosen.  \n  \n—Fyodor Dostoevsky \n* \n  \nHere are some recent small poems from my journal: \n  \nwalking on the earth \nevery step a prayer \n* \n  \nraspberries say what i want to say \nbetter than i can \n* \n  \nhow did i get to be old? \ni used to be young  \nwhat the hell happened? \n* \n  \nbriefly visiting book after book \ni’m like a hummingbird going from flower to flower  \n* \n  \nstart your day with hummingbirds \nnot the new york times \n* \n  \nthe problem with being one-with-everything  \nis all the misery \n* \n  \nmodern farming \n  \nget up early \nfeed the tofurkys \nmilk the oats \n* \n  \nit’s the most beautiful day since the world began \na bumblebee is on the lobelia \n* \n  \ni’m transitioning \nfrom happiness \nto bliss \n* \n  \nLet’s end with a brief passage from the book Peace Is Every Step by the Vietnamese Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh. Like many of the things here\, it’s a story in the sense that it is a way of experiencing and understanding our precious life on this beautiful planet  \nHere’s a thought: \nIf you find yourself feeling ungrateful\, you might remind yourself that the average surface temperature on the planet Venus is 867 degrees Fahrenheit. \n  \nInterbeing \n  \nIf you are a poet\, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud\, there will be no rain; without rain\, the trees cannot grow; and without trees\, we cannot make paper. The cloud is essential for the paper to exist. If the cloud is not here\, the sheet of paper cannot be here either. So we can say that the cloud and the paper inter-are. “Interbeing” is a word that is not in the dictionary yet\, but if we combine the prefix “inter-“ with the verb “to be\,” we have a new verb\, inter-be.  \n  \nIf we look into this sheet of paper even more deeply\, we can see the sunshine in it. Without sunshine\, the forest cannot grow. In fact\, nothing can grow without sunshine. And so\, we know that the sunshine is also in this sheet of paper. The paper and the sunshine inter-are. And if we continue to look\, we can see the logger who cut the tree and brought it to the mill to be transformed into paper. And we see wheat. We know that the logger cannot exist without his daily bread\, and therefore the wheat that became his bread is also in this sheet of paper. The logger’s father and mother are in it too. When we look in this way\, we see that without all of these things\, this sheet of paper cannot exist. \n  \nLooking even more deeply\, we can see ourselves in this sheet of paper too. This is not difficult to see\, because when we look at a sheet of paper\, it is part of our perception. Your mind is in here and mine is also. So we can say that everything is in here with this sheet of paper. We cannot point out one thing that is not here—time\, space\, the earth\, the rain\, the minerals in the soil\, the sunshine\, the cloud\, the river\, the heat. Everything co-exists with this sheet of paper. That is why I think the word inter-be should be in the dictionary. “To be” is to inter-be. We cannot just be by ourselves alone. We have to inter-be with every other thing. This sheet of paper is\, because everything else is. \n  \n—Thich Nhat Hanh\, from the book Peace Is Every Step
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-11-6-25/
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DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20251011T160000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251004T022124Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251004T022124Z
UID:5889-1760191200-1760198400@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:The Stories We Tell Ourselves: An Inquiry  10/11/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nThe Stories We Tell Ourselves: \nan inquiry  \n  \nwith Johnny Stallings \n\nSaturday\, October 11th\, 2 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \n  \nthis Open Road event is free \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/the-stories-we-tell-ourselves-an-inquiry-10-11-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/81jHEoQqLHL._AC_SX679_.jpg
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20251001
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20251106
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20251001T214214Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251005T112536Z
UID:5871-1759276800-1762387199@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  10/2/25
DESCRIPTION:The Harvesters by Pieter Bruegel the Elder \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nOctober 2\, 2025 \n  \nCrossing a bare common\, in snow puddles\, at twilight\, under a clouded sky\, without having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune\, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear. \n  \n—from Nature\, by Ralph Waldo Emerson \n* \n  \nThe Turn \n  \nThere are the asters\, of course \nbarnyard hollyhocks\, determined \nsky blue chicory flowers hanging on \nMostly though it’s the light \nfiltered through lingering fire haze \nsharp and soft all at the same time \n  \nBathe in the light\, air freshening \nrain\, as green turns inward \nleaves glisten yellow gold\, red \n  \nA stoplight of sorts. Time to \nget out the big books\, deep \nreflections\, collars up and warm \n  \nAgainst the chill\, that is\, \nsurely\, on its way. \n  \n—Elizabeth Domike\, October 2025 \n* \n  \nGail Lester shared this poem: \n  \nGift \n  \nA day so happy\nFog lifted early\, I worked in the garden\nHummingbirds were stopping over honeysuckle flowers\nThere was nothing on earth I wanted to possess.\nI knew no one worth my envying him.\nWhatever evil I had suffered\, I forgot.\nTo think that once I was the same man did not embarrass me.\nIn my body I felt no pain.\nWhen straightening up\, I saw the blue sea and sails. \n  \nBerkley\, 1971 \n  \n—Czeslaw Milosz (1911-2004) \n* \n  \nSomeone wrote in the last [August] PLHU that Peace Love Happiness and Understanding are all related\, inseparable—and I agree. \n  \nMy ‘journey’ started with a search for Understanding—learning to understand those different from myself. It led me to five trips to the deep South to learn more about relations between whites and African Americans. Then to work with and mentor rough teenagers. Then to befriend a Native American woman and her family—and remain a friend for eighteen years. To work in the Hispanic community of Hood River as a tutor in English. To tutor severely dyslexic teenagers and adults (a very poignant experience!). To facilitate a discussion group of fifteen to twenty men at Two Rivers Correctional Institution (a life-changing experience!).  \n  \nAnd now (since my beloved prison group is no more)\, I am learning to understand imminent death as a Hospice volunteer. I am a ‘companion’ to two people\, a 90 year old woman and (sadly) a 63 year old man. My conversations with the woman are jewel-like; she is a jewel. We have so much in common and we have become very close. My conversations with the man \, after the first visit\, have been non-existent; he is a paraplegic and bound in a hospital bed in his home\, with his dear wife. He didn’t have the strength to talk\, so I sit by his side\, give him frequent fluids\, watch 1980 reruns of Emergency!—- and give his wife the time to take a much-needed nap. \n  \n  \nAll of these journeys of Understanding result in Love for all those I meet\, Peace in my heart that I can feel the love\, and Happiness that this life can encompass so much richness. \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \nRocky is now at Oregon State Correctional Institution in Salem\, with seven months to “the gate.” Here are excerpts from some of his letters: \n  \n8-21-25 \n  \nWhen we reach out with our hearts\, yearning to become entwined like ivy\, spinning\, climbing\, and gently becoming together as one\, like Baucis and Philemon\, we show the world what love looks like. \n  \nI see it in nature\, I see it all around\, the way the soil meets the trees. It’s a relationship they share\, made out of love—the way the sea is in love with the shore. \n  \nIf you look closely at all the world and everything around\, there’s a relationship that has no bounds. The harmony of love that keeps all things together is plain to see. It’s written in the mountains\, rivers\, clouds\, rocks & upon our very own hearts. \n  \n8-22-25 \n  \nIt’s important to me to maintain a good amount of love and joy and acceptance of others & their feelings & emotions. My dream & my outlook is to experience as much wellness\, beauty & love as possible with the people in my life. I want to support and love my friends & my new family as much as my being will allow. I would like to have deeply intellectual\, witty\, kind and smart relationships\, to share my heart openly\, unafraid of people—just love and be loved. \n  \n9-1-25 \n  \nI remember back then…how badly I wanted forgiveness & did not know how to give it to myself & how you all showed me the way to do it\, and how I still fought it\, so I could beat myself up for all my wrongs. I can look back & now look at the present & see that if I just live and be love and accept all for what it is & do the best I can in all of it\, I’m going to do good for my life & for the lives of others too. I can truly say that I like who I am and what I’ve become. I can’t wait to live a new life with a new me. I’m ready. \n  \n9-3-2025 \n  \nI feel that the simple way of living a day-to-day life is one of the keys to a truly successful utopian society. We all work as one to achieve life…a happy life\, full of quality & love. I’ve got ideas of what it should be\, part of me thinks it is more of a state of mind. Living from an inner peace\, a utopia inside each of us\, and if that’s the case it would hopefully spread like fire. \n  \n9-13-2025 \n  \nMy first letter from OSCI…. \n  \nOn the way here I could see out of the window of the bus the change of nature. Right by Cascade Locks\, the dark deep green of the forest & the fog and mist in the tops of the Douglas Firs were breathtaking. I could feel the mist in my lungs & it made memories of times past flood back into my mind. We have such a beautiful place on Earth. It’s enchanting & fills the soul with beauty…. \n  \nIn my heart of hearts\, the want is always growing in my mind’s eye to share moments of joy & love amongst everyone. To have simple conversation that reveal what is deepest in our own beings. Never being held back\, but showing our hearts to all who wish to see them. I want to be open to others when I’m no longer in a cage. \n  \nA cage I’ve outgrown so long ago. \nI want to love what I do \nI want to love who I want \nand be loved in kind. \nI want to see the world in \neveryone’s eyes\, feel the love \nin their hearts\, & know the \nbeauty we have in our minds. \nThe rain has cleansed the soul. \n  \n—Rocky Hutchinson \n* \n  \nLast Saturday (9/27)\, Katie Radditz and I invited friends to get together to talk about the Essential Hippie Library. We all talked about where we were and what we were doing between 1968 and 1972. It was fun! This morning (9/29)\, I sent an email to Katie and Howard Thoresen and Charles Erickson. Here it is: \n  \nIf you’re going to San Francisco \nBe sure to wear some flowers in your hair \nIf you’re going to San Francisco \nYou’re gonna meet some gentle people there \n  \nFor those who come to San Francisco \nSummertime will be a love-in there \nIn the streets of San Francisco \nGentle people with flowers in their hair \n  \n—“San Francisco\,” by John Edmund Andrew Phillips; popularized by Scott McKenzie \n  \ndear Howard & Katie & Charles \n  \ni had a thought this morning… \na lot was happening between 1968 and 1972 \nto mention a few things: women’s liberation\, black liberation\, native american liberation\, gay liberation\, the vietnam war and the anti-war movement\, jimi hendrix\, country joe and the fish (etc.\, etc.)\, magical mystery tour\, marijuana\, psychedelics\, looking glass bookstore\, birth control pills\, the first earth day\, hermann hesse\, carlos castaneda\, whole earth catalog (etc.\, etc.)\, hitchhiking\, communes\, crunchy granola\, yoga\, long hair\, vegetarianism… \none thing we all remember were the vibes–they were friendly and laid back and gentle \nyou were supposed to DO YOUR OWN THING \nand we did \nthinking back on that time\, what influenced me (and many others) most profoundly was THE EAST \nthe beatles went to india \nalan watts and joseph campbell and gary snyder and r. h. blyth and allen ginsberg and richard alpert had all been to the east \nand there were all those yogis and zen teachers–shunryu suzuki\, krishnamurti\, thich nhat hanh\, nitya chaitanya yati\, yogi bhajan\, bhaktivedanta prabhupada\, maharishi mahesh yogi\, rajneesh\, swami satchidananda\, sasaki roshi (etc.\, etc.) \nwe read the tao te ching and consulted the i ching \nit has always seemed incredible to me that there is no word for dhyāna in any of the european languages \nwe use the english word “meditation\,” but it’s original meaning meant something like “to think about\,” and dhyāna is about being awake and alert with a quiet mind \nanyhow\, here’s this morning’s new (to me) idea… \nin addition to meditation and yoga\, one of the big things we got from THE EAST was the idea of nonviolence—ahimsa \nseems incredible\, but…the west has always been so warlike \nso not only did we not have the idea of sitting in silence\, we didn’t have the idea of non-hurting—although there was the occasional oddball vegetarian\, like leonardo da vinci and mary & percy bysshe shelley \nmartin luther king was inspired by gandhi \nand his nonviolence helped to inspire the peace movement–the largest one in the history of this country up to that time \ngentle people with flowers in their hair \nas far as i know\, vegetarianism traces its origin to buddha and mahavira–about 500 b.c. in india \nit has been a part of buddhist and hindu beliefs ever since \nand it changes the way you see the world \nit changes the way you feel \ni know why i became a vegetarian \nit was because i read autobiography of a yogi and yogananda was a vegetarian\, and i wanted to be like him! \ni’m sure that people have tried to get out of going to war since the beginning of time–even odysseus tried to get out of going to troy by pretending to be insane— \nbut during the hippie era millions of young men all had the same feeling:  \n“i don’t want to kill anyone” \nand the fact that there were lots of other “gentle people” that didn’t want to do that made it easier to say “no” to war \njoan baez and her sisters pauline and mimi had a poster of themselves with the slogan: GIRLS SAY YES to boys who say NO \nwell\, that’s my thought for this morning \n  \npeace & love \njohnny \n* \n  \nJohnny put together a gathering of old hippies\, whether we identify as that or not\, to discuss the books of the Sixties and Seventies that were important to us.  We piled our books and comix on the center table like an altar. Some changed our lives and helped us along a new path.  Reflecting on our stories made me go back to some origins of non-conformism in literature and the influence in art from those seers and brave souls bearing witness.    \n  \nI love Thoreau\, who influenced me when i took a break my senior year of college and lived in a cabin in the Mt Hood Forest\, my own little pond near by Camp Creek. \n  \nThoreau was criticized ferociously by his capitalist\, conventional townspeople. They could not fathom the value of taking a retreat to pay close attention to his surroundings\, to take a break from some prescribed working path. Out of that experience he wrote the first seminal ecology book and journals used now to study climate changes in agriculture. He was the first person to publish a Buddhist text in America\, with the translation help of Elizabeth Peabody. He looked deeply at the consequences of cutting down the forest and shipping trees away on the new railroad lines. He wrote “Civil Disobedience\,” which inspired Gandhi\, Martin Luther King\, and Thich Nhat Hanh in changing the world with nonviolent protest of social injustice.  \n  \nComing up to the Sixties\, there was the confluence of movements that led to a counterculture revolution. There was Women’s Liberation\, and books like Sexual Politics. We ate “natural foods.” Food Co-Ops sprung up. Communes developed. There was Mother Earth News\, Monday Night Class and Whole Earth Catalog. We protested against the Vietnam War and read Underground Comix—Mr. Natural and The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers. There were psychedelic posters of rock concerts at the Fillmore Auditorium.  \n  \nAt Looking Glass Bookstore in downtown Portland\, we distributed alternative magazines and comix mainly in the Pacific Northwest to record stores and bookstores and Natural Food stores. There was only one news distributor in town then\, and every store got whatever the distributor gave them.  Mother Earth News was considered “radical”—dangerous to the status quo. Just imagine what people thought of Coevolution Quarterly and Whole Earth Catalog! We broke out of an era of accepted censorship that was not even realized by most people except artists. \n  \nThere was also the Spiritual Revolution\, when Yoga and the yogis came to the West Coast\, bringing teachings and books first published in India\, and later in the U.S. In Oregon we had our own bright lights: Ursula Le Guin\, Gary Snyder\, the Staffords\, Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters—to name some of the game changers.  \n  \nMusic and Theater and Literature made the counterculture a joyful intellectual and soulful revolution—out of the 50’s\, into an era of freedoms. The government was so afraid. Feels very familiar to our current situation.   \n  \nI remember going to college in 1968\, and for the first time\, girls did not have to wear skirts to school or on campus. We just showed up with jeans and bicycles after a summer of love and enlightenment.  \n  \nOn reflection from our talk Saturday\, i realized how the counterculture spread up and down the East and West coasts. But much was not available across the Midwest\, which might help to account for the divide we see today. How do we share the beauty of living without such experience to draw on? Art is the most important medium to cross and embrace communities! Censorship is the dark shut down.  \n  \nAt the end of our gathering on Saturday\, Andy Larkin consulted the I Ching\, asking: How shall we live? The hexagram was number 8\, Pi / Holding Together: “What is required is that we unite with others\, in order that all may complement and aid one another through holding together.” It also warned of the great danger of having a corrupt leader at the center. Sigh. . . \n  \nI look forward to rereading some of the great books of hippie times: Hesse\, Le Guin\, Susan Griffin. And making bread again from The Tassajara Bread Book!  Thank you\, Johnny\, for holding us together\, and taking a long view.    \n  \nHere is a poem from those days ringing true now.   \nGary agrees it’s a good one\, and sends his regards. \n  \nI Went into the Maverick Bar \n  \nI went into the Maverick Bar    \nIn Farmington\, New Mexico. \nAnd drank double shots of bourbon \n              backed with beer. \nMy long hair was tucked up under a cap \nI’d left the earring in the car. \nTwo cowboys did horseplay \n             by the pool tables\, \nA waitress asked us \n                         where are you from? \na country-and-western band began to play    \n“We don’t smoke Marijuana in Muskokie”    \nAnd with the next song\, \n                         a couple began to dance. \n  \nThey held each other like in High School dances    \n                         in the fifties; \nI recalled when I worked in the woods \n                         and the bars of Madras\, Oregon.    \nThat short-haired joy and roughness— \n                         America—your stupidity.    \nI could almost love you again. \n  \nWe left—onto the freeway shoulders— \n                         under the tough old stars— \nIn the shadow of bluffs \n                         I came back to myself\, \nTo the real work\, to \n                         “What is to be done.” \n  \n—Gary Snyder \n  \n—Katie Radditz \n* \n  \nKim and Perrin just got back from a trip to Iceland\, England & Ireland. Here’s a poem: \n  \nThe Weather Will Change \n  \nSometimes you stagger with the wind \nagainst your face\, rain in a river down \nyour back\, and you begin to wonder \nhow it’s fair to suffer so. But the weather \nwill change\, sun come your way\, and you \nwill wander easy once again. Sometimes \nlife is good\, it all goes your way\, luck \nfollows luck for days and days. But then \nyour weather changes\, and you will \nfind it strange to suffer like the others \nyou passed by. Sometimes your country \nfalters\, leaders lead astray\, and all the old \nassumptions for the good are gone. But \nthe weather will change\, and we will \nfind it strange to remember our gloom \nwhile it rained and rained and rained. \n  \n—Kim Stafford \n* \n  \nKim & Perrin shared this letter that Nick Cave wrote to a friend who had asked: “Where do you stand?” \n  \nDear Alastair\, \n  \nI acknowledge that this may be\, to you and your friends\, an unhelpful admission\, but I’m not entirely sure where I stand on anything these days. As the ground shifts and slides beneath us\, and the world hardens around its particular views\, I become increasingly uncertain and less self-assured. I am neither on the left nor on the right\, finding both sides\, as they mainly present themselves\, indefensible and unrecognizable. I am essentially a liberal-leaning\, spiritual conservative with a small ‘c’\, which\, to me\, isn’t a political stance\, rather it is a matter of temperament. I have a devotional nature\, and I see the world as broken but beautiful\, believing that it is our urgent and moral duty to repair it where we can and not to cause further harm\, or worse\, willfully usher in its destruction. I think we consist of more than mere atoms crashing into each other\, and that we are\, instead\, beings of vast potential\, placed on this earth for a reason—to magnify\, as best we can\, that which is beautiful and true.  I believe we have an obligation to assist those who are genuinely marginalized\, oppressed\, or sorrowful in a way that is helpful and constructive and not to exploit their suffering for our own professional advancement or personal survival. I have an acute and well-earned understanding of the nature of loss and know in my bones how easy it is for something to break\, and how difficult it is to put it back together. Therefore\, I am cautious with the world and try to treat all its inhabitants with care. \n  \nI am comfortable with doubt and am constitutionally resistant to moral certainty\, herd mentality and dogma. I am disturbed on a fundamental level by the self-serving\, toddler politics of some of my counterparts—I do not believe that silence is violence\, complicity\, or a lack of courage\, but rather that silence is often the preferred option when one does not know what they are talking about\, or is doubtful\, or conflicted—which\, for me\, is most of the time. I am mainly at ease with not knowing and find this a spiritually and creatively dynamic position. I believe that there are times when it is almost a sacred duty to shut the fuck up. \n  \nI’m not particularly concerned about where people stand—I’ve met some of the finest individuals from across the political spectrum. In fact\, I take pride and immense pleasure in having friends with divergent views. My life is significantly more interesting and colorful with them in it.  \n  \nPerhaps this all amounts to very little\, but I suppose\, in the end\, I value deeds over words. I see my own role as a musician\, songwriter\, and letter writer as actively serving the soul of the world\, and I’ve come to understand that this is the position that I must adopt in order to attempt to cultivate genuine change. In fact\, I am now beginning to understand where I do stand\, Alistair—I stand with the world\, in its goodness and beauty. In these hysterical\, monochromatic\, embattled times\, I call to its soul\, the way musicians can\, to its grieving and broken nature\, to its misplaced meaning\, to its fragile and flickering spirit. I sing to it\, praise it\, encourage it\, and strive to improve it—in adoration\, reconciliation\, and leaping faith.  \n  \nLove\, Nick
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-10-2-25/
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SUMMARY:Guide to the Essential Hippie Library  9/27/25
DESCRIPTION:  \n  \nGuide to the Essential Hippie Library \n  \n  \na playful romp through the ideas that shaped the Hippie Worldview  \nwith Katie Radditz & Johnny Stallings \n  \nKatie Radditz & Bill Kloster were the genial proprietors of Looking Glass Bookstore\, in downtown Portland\, from 1970 to 2001. Back in the day\, hippies went there to get copies of the Whole Earth Catalog\, Be Here Now\, Zap Comix and other hippie classics. Johnny was one of their regular customers. \n  \nSaturday\, September 27th\, 2 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \nthis Open Road event is free \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/johnnys-guide-to-the-essential-hippie-library-9-27-25/
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SUMMARY:¡EUTOPIAS!  9/13/25
DESCRIPTION:  \n¡EUTOPIAS! \n  \na journey through dreams of better worlds with Johnny Stallings \n  \nSaturday\, September 13\, 2 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont\, in Portland \n  \nthis Open Road event is free
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/eutopias-9-13-25/
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SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  9/4/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \nSeptember 4\, 2025 \n  \nAh Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire \nTo grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire\, \nWould not we shatter it to bits — and then \nRe-mould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire! \n  \n—The Rubaiyat  of Omar Khayyam\, translated by Edward Fitzgerald \n* \n  \nA map of the world that does not include Utopia is not even worth glancing at… \n  \n—Oscar Wilde \n* \n  \nTo create around ourselves the kind of world that we wish to live in—isn’t that the most important project of our lives? \n  \n—the Russian clown\, Slava Polunin \n* \n  \nI will not cease from mental strife \nNor shall my sword sleep in my hand \nTill we have built Jerusalem \nIn England’s green and pleasant land. \n  \n—William Blake \n* \n  \nWandering through Eutopias \n  \nOn Saturday\, September 13th\, I’m going to present ¡Eutopias! at Taborspace—the latest in a series of “entertainments.” Ideas of utopias and of paradise have always intrigued me. My original idea was to talk about\, and maybe read from\, famous utopias like Plato’s Politeia (The Republic)\, Thomas More’s Utopia and some more recent visions\, like Aldous Huxley’s Island and Ernest Callenbach’s Ecotopia. \n  \nAs I began my researches\, the first thing I discovered was that the topic of “utopia” is vast! It was like going down a rabbit hole\, and finding endless tunnels branching off. Easy to get lost. \n  \nLet’s start with Webster’s definitions: \n  \nutopia (noun) \n  \n1. often capitalized: a place of ideal perfection\, especially in laws\, government\, and social conditions \n2. an impractical scheme for social improvement \n3. an imaginary and indefinitely remote place \n  \nAgain\, according to Webster’s\, synonyms include: \n  \nparadise\, heaven\, nirvana\, Eden\, wonderland\, fantasyland\, Garden of Eden\, Zion\, Cockaigne\, Sion\, promised land\, Camelot\, Elysium\, empyrean\, Shangri-la\, New Jerusalem\, bliss\, lotusland\, never-never land\, joy\, fairyland\, dreamland\, dreamworld\, arcadia\, blissfulness\, euphoria\, blessedness\, gladness \n  \nYou can see where this is going… There are countless books and scholarly articles written just about “Arcadia” and the pastoral ideal in literature. The last word on the synonym list\, “gladness\,” is a synonym for “happiness”—which is another endless topic. Where to begin? \n  \nIn this essay\, I’m going to suggest that the utopian impulse arises from the irresistible idea that “things could be better than they are.” Another idea I want to explore is that “utopia” might be more about the way we see and experience the world than about the way things are—or might be. I want to look at literary utopias\, like More’s and Huxley’s\, and also utopian experiments in what we like to call “the real world.” Webster’s synonyms for “utopia” suggest imaginary places\, but I’m sitting in Eutopia right now—The Tao of Tea. More about this later… \n  \nA good starting place for our journey together through utopian realms is with Sir (Saint) Thomas More (1478-1535). He was a critic of capital punishment who had his head chopped off. (His original sentence was to be hanged\, drawn and quartered\, but Henry VIII commuted it to decapitation.) Thomas More coined the word “utopia” when he wrote a long letter (in Latin) to his friend Erasmus about a fictional traveler who had come upon an island in the New World where the customs were different than in 16th Century England. The two friends liked to joke with each other\, and “utopia” could be derived from the Greek outopia\, meaning “no place\,” or from eutopia\, meaning “good place” or “happy place.” In this essay\, I am “wandering through Eutopias\,” but if I had wandered in More’s Utopia\, I would have been arrested and punished for vagrancy. No slackers allowed. In many utopias\, like Gerard Winstanley’s\, everyone was required to work\, unlike Harry McClintock’s Hobo Utopia\, “Big Rock Candy Mountain\,” where “they hung the jerk that invented work.” But I digress… I can’t help it! I’m in a rabbit warren here! (Note to Reader: this essay may resemble the non-linear way my mind works: “that reminds me of another thing\, which reminds me of another thing\, which reminds me of another thing…”) \n  \nOn the positive side of the ledger\, in More’s Utopia they had NO MONEY! There was free public education for all—including women! There was freedom of religion—as long as you believed in God. War with other countries was to be avoided\, if possible. Capital punishment was reserved only for the most extreme crimes\, like murder. In More’s day\, you could be hung for picking pockets or for being a “witch.” \n  \nThe first major literary utopia is Plato’s Republic—two thousand years before Thomas More’s Utopia\, although Webster’s synonym “lotusland” suggests that Homer’s Odyssey gives us glimpses of pleasant imaginary realms—the Land of the Lotus Eaters\, and Calypso’s island\, and the land of the Phaeacians. In the Gilgamesh epic\, the hero visits the mortal-turned-immortal Utnapishtim\, who lives in a magical realm at the End of the World. \n  \nOne more thought about Odysseus and utopia. The beautiful Goddess Calypso offers him a life of pleasure and immortality (!)\, but he wants to go home and live out his last years with his wife Penelope. That’s his utopia! \n  \nI wouldn’t want to live in Plato’s ideal city-state—(like Stephen Dedalus\, I would get kicked out\, anyway)—but I want to give Plato full credit for doing something radical and new—criticizing his own society. Aristophanes does this too\, in a comic vein\, without presenting serious alternatives. That’s not his job. He’s a comedian.  \n  \nPlato was the first person to write out a detailed rational alternative to his society. Up until that time\, my guess is that people accepted the society that they lived in as “the way things are.” Maybe there was some complaining\, and even a few suggestions. Of course\, as Heraclitus and the Buddhists say\, everything is always changing\, and especially in Periclean Athens\, where there were major innovations in theater\, democracy\, philosophy and sculpture. \n  \nUnlike Homer’s imaginary Land of the Lotus Eaters\, Plato was imagining societal improvements that he hoped would actually come about. Even though Athenians were proud of their city and considered it superior to other cities\, Plato believed that there was a lot of room for improvement. He missed some obvious things\, like the abolition of slavery and equal rights for women. He outlined five different forms of government\, of which he felt rule by a Philosopher-King was the best. Democracy was near the bottom of his list. \n  \nThe five forms of government that Plato outlined\, in ranked order\, are: Aristocracy\, Timocracy\, Oligarchy\, Democracy and Tyranny. We think of “Aristocracy” as meaning rule by an “upper class.” Plato\, who coined the word\, meant something different. From aristos\, “the best\,” he meant rule by the wisest and most virtuous people in the polis. Plato\, who devoted his life to Philosophy\, the “love of wisdom\,” wanted to ensure that the ruler of a city state was\, by rigorous training\, the wisest person. Someone like him. He spent a lot of his life trying to get his philosophy students to go into politics and to get tyrants to become philosophers. That last project didn’t go well for him. He was arrested and sold into slavery by the tyrant Dionysius I of Syracuse. \n  \nTimocracy was rule by (hopefully) honorable military leaders. Oligarchy is rule by wealthy elites—something we are quite familiar with. There has never been a pure Democracy—not here and not in Periclean Athens. Plato thought that because people were susceptible to demagogues\, they might actually elect a tyrant. Fortunately\, that could never happen here.  \n  \nPlato had a special\, personal reason for distrusting Democracy. The citizens of Athens had voted to put his beloved teacher Socrates to death.  \n  \nTyrannos was once a neutral word that just meant “king.” By Plato’s day\, experience with tyrants had given the word a negative connotation. They were more likely to be selfish and cruel than wise and virtuous. \n  \nA form of government that Plato doesn’t mention is “Kleptocracy\,” rule by thieves and conmen who use their political power to enrich themselves. There are many examples in the modern world\, including the Somoza Family in Nicaragua\, Putin and the other Russian oligarchs\, the Saudi royal family\, the Trump family\, et cetera. Maybe Plato didn’t need the word “kleptocracy” because it was assumed that kings (tyrants) like Cyrus the Great naturally amassed the most wealth. \n  \nPlato’s system was rational—too rational. It highlights some fatal flaws in utopian visions: there is no one right way to live; one person’s utopia is another person’s dystopia; good societies are not created by one person telling everyone else how to live. They evolve out of complex collective changes—for better or worse. \n  \nThere’s a eutopia inside Plato’s utopia\, known as the Allegory of the Cave. According to Plato\, our ordinary experience of the world is a play of shadows on the walls of a cave. We can break our chains\, make our way to the mouth of the cave\, and see the Sun. In India this is known as moksha\, “Freedom”; in Buddhism\, nirvana\, which might be translated as “extinction.” Buddha spoke of it as “waking up.” Plato said that if you try to tell the dreamers in the cave about the indescribable reality you have seen\, they will think you are mad. \n  \nIn the two thousand years between Plato’s vision and More’s\, people in Europe weren’t writing about how things could be better here on earth. This was seen as a Fallen World. Hopeless\, really. Paradise would come for some after death\, in Heaven. Jesus’ death on the cross redeemed humanity from Sin and Death. Unless it didn’t. In Dante’s vision\, an eternal Paradise of Light and Love for the fortunate few is balanced with a nightmare vision of eternal punishment\, pain\, torment and damnation for the majority of “sinful” humans. \n  \nAn Interlude:  \n  \nFor me\, The Library is Eutopia!—Multnomah County Library or my own library. Powell’s Books. Belmont Books\, Backstory Books & Yarn! BOOKS!!! Every book\, like every person\, is a World. Some of my best friends are authors: Walt Whitman\, William Shakespeare\, Susan Griffin\, R. H. Blyth\, Thomas Traherne\, Harold Bloom\, William Blake\, J. Krishnamurti\, Hafez\, Han Shan\, Lao Tzu… It’s a list that goes on and on and on. \n  \nMoving right along… \n  \nAnother way of looking at utopias is that every time someone\, alone or with others\, attempts to make something new\, something beautiful\, something good\, it is a utopian experiment—starting a nonprofit organization (there are millions of them on Planet Earth)\, opening a new restaurant or a new bookstore\, growing a garden\, painting a picture\, making a movie\, putting on a play. Eutopias are everywhere! \n  \nIt’s important to note that some people’s ideas of a better world are at odds with other people’s ideas. In many imagined utopias wealth is abolished and people share everything. That’s definitely not Ayn Rand’s version. And at the worst\, some utopian visions\, when put into practice\, bring about more suffering than we can even begin to imagine. The visions of Adolf Hitler and Mao Tse-Tung\, and the deaths of millions\, come to mind. Many attempts to make things better\, make them worse. The dream of the Industrial Revolution to free us from toil and solve all our problems had ecological consequences that were not imagined. \n  \nIn fact\, there’s always a Snake in the Garden. No matter how good your idea\, there will be problems. Because any imagined world\, just like “the real world\,” has things in it that “don’t work”—that are unfair\, unjust\, flawed. No matter how clever we are\, we can’t avoid suffering or death. \n  \nAccording to the legend\, Prince Gautama was already a grown man with a wife and a son before he had any idea that there were such things as sickness\, old age and death. He was so troubled by these things that he left his palace in search of some kind of answer. After years of soul searching\, he had an experience of perfect inner peace and freedom. He taught that suffering is caused by craving and that when we wake from our delusions we get off the endless Wheel of Birth and Death—we’re awake\, we’ve seen the Sun\, we’re free! In later Buddhism\, the bodhisattvas decided that they didn’t want to get off that Wheel. They wanted to return again and again to the world of suffering mortals in order to help them. \n  \nBack in the Hippie Days\, a lot of people started communes\, where they could go back to the Land\, grow organic fruits and vegetables\, and live together in Peace and Harmony. This was not a new idea. In the Nineteenth Century there were all kinds of ideas about\, and experiments with\, making a better world (for humans)\, like Brook Farm and Oneida. Two impressive examples are The Communist Manifesto of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and the spiritual vision of Joseph Smith and the founding of the Mormon Church. \n  \nsome notes:  \n  \nEvery society and every culture\, from the first homo sapiens till now\, is an experiment\, a work in progress\, that is always changing—slowly or rapidly. And they are all different. Because they are not all alike (impossible!)\, you will naturally find that in some places people are relatively friendly and happy\, and in other places people\, on the whole\, might be more angry or unhappy. There are countries where practically every adult is an alcoholic! That can’t be good. In Bali\, there’s a special ceremony for children when they reach the age of six months. They  touch the earth for the first time! Up until then\, they are constantly held by mothers\, fathers\, brothers\, sisters\, aunts\, uncles\, cousins\, neighbors. \n  \nThis variety is true not just of countries and cultures\, but of states and cities and towns and families. By sheer chance\, you can be born into a family where you are loved and admired and valued\, or one where you get your teeth knocked out. \n  \nNow\, back to Marx and Engels and the Mormons… \n  \nThe basic idea of Communism is: “From each according to his ability\, to each according to his need.” This doesn’t sound so terrible\, does it? In fact this idea is as old as the hills. When people lived in tribes and hunted and gathered food\, this was the only possible arrangement. Food was shared with everyone—even those too old or too young to get it for themselves. \n  \nOn More’s island of Utopia\, and in many imagined and actual utopian experiments\, sharing was preferred to competition. The words “communism” and “community” are related. The dreams of Marx and Engels didn’t turn out well in places like Russia and China because of ruthless totalitarian ideologues who were happy to murder millions of people in order to pave the road to a “better world.” Maybe “mixed-economies\,” like those in Scandinavia\, provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. \n  \nMarx’s vision and Buddha’s and Muhammad’s changed the world. Joseph Smith’s vision changed Utah. Just kidding. But it certainly caught on with a lot of people. According to a statistical report of the Church of the Latter Day Saints\, as of December 31\, 2024\, there were 17\,509\,781 members worldwide.  \n  \nEvery religion and every country—every town and city!—can be seen as a utopian experiment. They are all flawed. That’s the Snake in the Garden. And the “flaws” are not small. Sometimes they are mind-boggling. Anti-Semitism for the Nazis. Our “Founding Fathers” were in favor of Free Speech and Freedom of Religion. Those are good things. Unfortunately\, our utopian experiment was “flawed” by a program of genocide against the people who already lived here\, and the most brutal slavery in the history of the world. \n  \nAnd another thing\, and another thing… \n  \nOur whole civilization is “flawed” by being Patriarchal. The God of Abraham doesn’t have a wife!  \n  \nOur Scientific-Materialist-Rational-Industrial-Capitalist Civilization is slightly flawed by the fact that in order to make the planet into a theme park for humans\, it is bringing about the sixth major “Extinction Event” in the history of the planet. That’s not good. \n  \nThe world is always everything-at-once. While most people are trying to be helpful\, there are always some geniuses that are working on new methods to kill everything that lives. It has been ever thus.  \n  \nVladimir Putin could decide—all by himself—to have the Russian military invade Ukraine. The United Nations is the eutopian experiment that’s supposed to prevent that from happening\, but\, alas!\, it’s flawed. Like this essay. Like everything. \n  \nOn the other hand… \n  \nI don’t want to end my essay on eutopias on a gloomy or despairing note. That would be wrong! It is dismaying for those of us with dreams of universal peace and love and happiness to witness seemingly endless examples of violence and greed and fear. It seems to me that the news media and social media relentlessly distort our perception of what is happening. If someone goes into a store or a school or a church and shoots people\, it makes the news. If a mother puts her newborn baby to her breast\, it’s not news. Is someone grows a carrot\, if a doctor in an emergency room saves a life\, if a child sings a song\, if a poet writes a poem\, if people volunteer at a food bank\, if a puppy licks your face\, it’s not news. You get the idea. I’m pretty sure that what’s happening right now on our beautiful blue planet is that most people are doing good things\, things that are useful and helpful—cooking food\, teaching school\, making love\, fixing the plumbing. Mostly people are generous and kind.  \n  \nEven if some people are trapped in visions of hatred and fear\, we can live in love. If hurt people hurt people\, we can be part of the healing. We can continue to help co-create a culture that nurtures what is best in everyone. In spite of countervailing forces\, we can be kind. We can be good. We don’t have to wait for Eutopia to come “some day.” We can make Eutopia where we are\, for ourselves and for others (who aren’t really “other.”) \n  \nSpring is expected to come again next year. (A firetruck just drove by and the handsome young firemen waved to the children.) We can write poems\, sing\, dance\, put on plays\, meditate\, do yoga. We can re-read “Song of Myself.” We can laugh and cry. \n  \nIf you look for them\, you can find eutopias everywhere. \n  \nEverything\, without exception\, is miraculous. \n  \nEveryone\, without exception\, has a radiant beauty at the core of their being. \n  \nI’m sorry… \n  \nI didn’t get around to talking about Brook Farm\, Sankai Juku\, Huxley’s Island\, Woodstock\, Rabelais’ Abbey of Theleme\, Gonzalo’s vision in The Tempest\, the pastoral eutopias in The Winter’s Tale and As You Like It\, Slava Polunin’s Moulin Jaune\, Bread & Puppet Theater\, The Farm in Tennessee and Plenty\, The Big Orange Splot\, World Central Kitchen\, Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights\, Ko-Falen\, Plum Village\, Farmers Markets\, Homeboy Industries\, Shakespeare’s Globe\, Elysian Fields\, the East Village\, Portland\, Plato’s Academy\, Oregon Country Fair\, the Quakers\, the Shakers\, the writings and projects of Christopher Alexander\, pirate utopias\, Golgonooza\, Shangri-La\, Alice’s Wonderland\, Transition Towns\, Valhalla\, Esalen\, Las Vegas\, Atlantis\, The Book of Revelations\, Portland’s Japanese Garden… \n  \nThere are endless tunnels in the rabbit warren. They go on and on… \n  \nIn Conclusion (for now): \n  \nThe Multnomah County Library is Eutopia. The Tao of Tea is Eutopia. Thursday morning coffee with my friends is Eutopia. FaceTime conversations with Howard Thoresen in New York and WhatsApp video conversations with Stratis Panourios in Athens are Eutopias. The room where I sit on the couch every morning\, across from Nancy\, enjoying quiet time and journal writing is Eutopia. \n  \nAnd… \n  \nSilence is Eutopia. Samādhi is Eutopia.  \n  \nThere’s a place I like to go every day\, a place of deep peace and boundless bliss\, a place of miracles everywhere and love without limit. I call it “The Golden World.”  \n  \nMy primary felt sense is that I’m living in Paradise\, that Eutopia is my home. \n  \n–Johnny Stallings
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-9-4-25/
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250806
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20250904
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
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LAST-MODIFIED:20250806T170010Z
UID:5821-1754438400-1756943999@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  8/7/25: Tributes to Jerry Smith
DESCRIPTION:Jerry & Donna Smith \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nAugust 7\, 2025 \n  \nIn honor of Jerry\, I will speak his name aloud to the trees and creatures of the earth\, and tell them of his beautiful heart. \n  \n—Abe Green \n* \n  \nOur dear friend Jerry Smith died peacefully at his home on July 8th. Without Jerry\, there would have been no prison dialogues or plays\, no “A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Prison” film\, no Open Hearts Open Minds\, no Open Road. His love and generosity changed many many lives\, including mine. \n* \n  \nDonna Smith dictated these words: \n  \nJerry and I met when we were 18 years old and got married when we were 20. We had big dreams of doing great things in the world. And in our 74 years together I believe we made a contribution. \n  \nJerry was generous. He was always willing to help people no matter what they needed. When he met a young girl with a broken bike\, he bought her a new one. He bought a lot of bikes. He helped bicyclists with their flat tires. He met a woman whose son needed heart surgery. He helped with that. There are many stories like this. \n  \nNow that he’s gone\, every room feels different. He was the love of my life. \n  \n—Donna \n* \n  \nHere’s a Father’s Day letter from his daughter Marsha: \n  \nDear Dad\, \n  \nA very “Happy Father’s Day” to you. Want to thank you for being a great Dad. For being the kind of person who doesn’t ask for or want their children to adjust their lives/schedules/political thinking/voting/child-raising philosophy/(insert anything here) to match what you think. I cannot ask for a better gift in life from a parent than this freedom. \n  \nOur brunch discussions from our time at Waverley have had such a lasting impact on me. I only wish that I was less dogmatic in my own ideas than I am today and more like you are\, and were\, when trying to help your children’s thinking through issues such as abortion\, the death penalty\, taxation\, etc.   \n  \nI thank you so much for that time and for continuing throughout your life with this willingness to see situations through the eyes of the other person.  \n  \nI love you very much.  \n  \nYour daughter\, Marsha \n* \n  \nJerry’s daughter Chris wrote this: \n  \nHey Dad\, \n  \nI’m so glad you knew how much I loved you and how thankful I am for all you’ve done for the whole family. You were an amazing dad\, and I just wanted to say thank you for everything.  \n  \nYou protected me\, when I was young\, and always made sure I was safe.  \n  \nYou guided me\, so that I would know right from wrong and counseled me\, when I clearly… “should have known better.” \n  \nYou gave me a childhood\, that most people can only dream of. \n  \nYou taught me not to  judge people too harshly.… “You never really know what someone is going through\,” you would say.  \n  \nYou treated me with compassion\, when it wasn’t deserved. \n  \nYou never told me what to think or believe\, but instead\, you gave me some really thought-provoking ideas. \n  \nYou taught me how to laugh at myself. You said it was important because\, well\, we’re all just humans\, with our flaws and all\, trying to figure out how to make the most of life. \n  \nYou made my son the most important person in your world. Thank you for that.  He’s an amazing man!  \n  \nThanks so much for always putting the family’s best interests first. And thank you for being such a great listener. \n  \nI know this might sound a bit biased\, but I honestly believe you’re the best dad I’ve ever had\, and you’re my hero! \n  \nI’ll always be so grateful for you. \n  \nI miss you a ton\, \n  \n—Chris \n* \n  \nJerry’s grandson Jordan wrote this: \n  \nGrowing up\, I used to feel a bit left out when conversations turned to dads. I didn’t have one around\, and it stung. But with time\, I realized something important—not everyone gets the incredible gift of having a grandfather like I did. \n  \nMost people knew him as Jerry. I had the exclusive honor of calling him Grandpa. He wasn’t just a grandparent—he was a father figure\, a mentor\, and a best friend. He taught me how to shoot a gun\, how to pitch a tent\, and how to drive a one-ton truck with a manual transmission. In every meaningful way\, I really did have a dad. \n  \nHe was generous and attentive\, always willing to listen. He made people laugh\, not with flashy jokes\, but with genuine humor and a warm wit that stayed with you. His success in life wasn’t measured by titles or wealth\, but by the community he built around him—one rooted in kindness\, loyalty\, and love. Until the very end\, he was surrounded by friends and family who adored him. \n  \nAs I write this\, I’m not only honoring my grandfather\, but also speaking to anyone who ever shared a good laugh with him. Anyone who’s ever made someone else smile because of something Jerry once said and those who have changed their lives for the better. Anyone who carries forward a bit of his spirit—his joy\, his wisdom\, his way of ending conversations with a clever remark. \n  \nIf you’ve changed for the better after knowing him—if he made you a little happier\, a little kinder—then I know he’s smiling. And I know he’s proud of you. \n  \n—Jordan \n* \n  \nNicholas Swift spoke at the Celebration of Life for Jerry. This is what he said: \n  \nGood afternoon. \n  \nMy name is Nicholas Swift. \nAnd I am one of the living testaments to what happens \nwhen someone chooses to believe in transformation— \nnot as a theory\, but as a practice. \n  \nWhen I was incarcerated\, I\, like most in that environment\, focused simply on surviving it. \nI had no roadmap. \nNo vision of a life worth reaching for—only the instinct to endure. \nAnd I don’t know if I can describe what life looks like when you’ve never seen what possibilities it might hold— \nonly the realities you were born into. \n  \nBut then something unexpected took root. \nNot because the walls changed—but because someone chose to plant sanctuary in the most unlikely of places. \n  \nThat sanctuary was a theater program. \nNot just as performance\, \nbut as a form of communal remembering— \na chance to become human again in the eyes of others\, \nto remember that emotion and authenticity still had a place in our lives\, \nto bear witness to others as they walked towards that same realization\, \nto watch a rising tide lift all ships\, \nand see people I never would have thought it possible of \nto become more genuine\, insightful\, authentic versions of themselves. \n  \nThe theater program gave me more than a stage. \nIt gave me back my imagination. \n  \nIt showed me\, through the presence of others— \nthrough the quiet\, powerful seeing of people who believed in it— \nthat living wasn’t just something you did once you got out. \nIt was something you could begin right there. \n  \nEach man who stepped into that space became\, \nknowingly or not\, \nan ambassador of possibility. \nA quiet signpost in the dark that said: \n“It doesn’t have to end like this.” \n  \nAnd for every person who walks through that system unconcerned with change\,  \nthere was someone else— \nsomeone like me— \nholding a hope they didn’t yet have words for. \n  \nThere was a quiet aspiration towards something we had no words for\, no way to describe beyond a felt sense of hope. \nTheater gave that hope language. \nIt gave it form. \nAnd most of all\, it gave me a future I hadn’t dared to picture. \n  \nNot just a release date. \nNot just a plan. \nBut a life. \n  \nSince then\, I’ve built a business\, become a Mentor\, and started working towards my own nonprofit. \nI want to offer to others what Jerry\, and his family\, through Johnny\, once offered to me and those like me— \na glimpse beyond survival\, toward something more true\, more free\, towards possibility. \n  \nAnd none of that would have been possible \nwithout the person we’re here to honor— \nand the family who trusted him\, who trusted us\, \nenough to let the work speak for itself. \n  \nSo I speak today \nnot just for myself\, \nbut for every quiet spark that took flame \nbecause someone believed we were worth the match. \n  \nThank you. \nFor believing in what we might become. \nFor giving us a reason to try. \n  \n—Nicholas Swift \n* \n  \nDenise Bare also spoke at the Celebration of Life for Jerry: \n  \nJerry Smith’s Thread That Reached Me \n  \nI never imagined I’d be standing here\, speaking at Jerry’s memorial. \n  \nNot as someone who spent time in prison. Not as someone who once thought her life was beyond repair. \n  \nBut here I am—because Jerry believed in someone else. \n  \nHe believed in his friend Johnny Stallings. He believed in Johnny’s wild idea that theater and art could belong in prison. That something sacred could happen when people on the inside were invited to sit in circle and talk about their lives. \n  \nJerry backed that vision before it had a name. Before there were programs or grants or success stories. He believed in Johnny—and because of that belief\, he ended up touching my life in ways I still can’t fully explain. He started bringing art into Two Rivers\, to Columbia River and finally to Coffee Creek\, where I was. Johnny had Carla Grant and Don Kern come and bring in theater and it changed my life. \n  \nI joined a theater circle while I was inside. Just a few hours a week. At first I thought it was a distraction. But it became a lifeline. A space where I could be human again. And behind that circle—behind the exercises\, the plays\, the visiting artists—was Jerry. \n  \nHe didn’t know me. But he believed in the people who believed in me. And sometimes\, that’s all it takes to change a life. \n  \nJerry’s belief in how art can heal\, restore\, and reconnect helped me find my voice. His giving created a ripple that reached me. And now I get to be part of that ripple for others. \n  \nThank you\, Jerry\, for trusting your friend and for never underestimating the power of a story shared. \n  \nI’m one of many you’ll never meet\, but whose life you helped rebuild. My love and gratitude to Jerry’s wife Donna\, daughters Christine\, Marsha\, and grandson Jordan. Your family is special and amazing\, and your Jerry has touched my life\, and I will forever be grateful. \n  \nAll my love & gratitude\, \nDenise Bare \n* \n  \nHere are some tributes to Jerry that people sent in: \n  \nDear Donna Smith and Smith family\, \n  \nEarly on I was involved in Johnny’s work at Two Rivers Prison and became the first Board president. I watched plays\, helped behind the scenes\, and marveled at the amazing event of Shakespeare being performed by men who were new to his work\, new to theater\, new to finding their own deeper voices. \n  \nLater I became one of the dialogue group leaders\, going out once a month\, often with Bushra Azzouz. And like so many in Open Hearts Open Minds. I participated in the work and delight of finishing Bushra’s film Midsummer’s Night’s Dream in Prison and presenting the wonderful premier in Portland. \n  \nSo much of what happened over the years at Two Rivers and then in other facilities in Oregon is the result of the interest and generosity of Jerry and Donna and the continuing support of all the family through the foundation. I feel grateful not just to have witnessed and participated in the OHOM’s programs but to have seen and benefited from the care of your entire family. \n  \nThis support did not end with OHOM\, in fact it continues\, but has also been a motive force behind Open Road. Johnny has stimulated discussions\, education and performances with Open Road\, taking it beyond prison walls into everyday lives. \n  \nI am writing to acknowledge all of this in honor of Jerry’s memory and in respect for all of you. Thank you so very much. So many lives have been changed by your generosity. \n  \nWith deep regards\,  \nDeborah Buchanan \n* \n  \nDear Johnny\, \n  \nI’m sorry to hear about the passing of your friend\, Jerry Smith.  I know what a significant person he was in your life. \n  \nOver the years I had a few conversations with him at the hotel where we stayed when we went to the plays. In one that particularly impressed me\, he spoke about his concern for you in a way that I could only describe as parental. It was clear to me that although he valued the work you were doing\, his deeper interest was in you personally\, and in your full flowering as a human being.  \n  \nWe often talk about how lucky we have been in life\, especially in the friendships we have enjoyed. You were particularly lucky in your relationship with Jerry\, and he was equally lucky to have passed some of his time with you. \n  \n—Howard Thoresen \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha & Jordon\, \n  \nI won’t try to speak to your loss\, our whole community’s loss\, except to lovingly wish you well as you live the coming days of grief and love. But I would like to say a bit about the gifts to the world that Jerry’s and all of your insightful generosity have made possible. I was able to attend several of the plays at Two Rivers as well as the movie of Midsummer Night’s Dream and the short one made by Prabu\, and gladly receive news of how Open Hearts Open Minds  and The Open Road continue to touch lives as well as Johnny’s monthly  “peace\, love\, happiness and understanding” newsletter. Each of these love-offerings has and continues to remind all who witness and participate of the transformative power of creativity and love of all kinds: power to heal deep wounds and uplift spirits. From the inspired vision vast enough to be a container for all these possibilities and more\, to the fragile precious moments of hope: what a wonderful legacy! \n  \nWith Love and Gratitude\, \nNancy Yeilding  \n* \n  \nJohnny\, you were blessed by the patronage of Jerry Smith\, which allowed you to manifest some of your dreams. \n  \nWhat a legacy he has left. The ripple of his loyalty\, love and support will last for generations. \n  \nHe believed in you! \n  \nSo do we. \n  \nWarm hugs \nBrenda Erickson \n* \n  \nI’ve said it a million times: “You all helped me and saved my life!” Living in a world full of love\, wonder and beauty is what you gave me—and Jerry helped make that possible. I see what you all have done…so many of us now live in a world of Joy… \n  \nMy name is Rocky Delos Hutchinson and although we have only met a few times\, the abilities that you all gave to others have been the seeds that were planted in my heart\, mind and soul\, which provided me with a new life—one I will soon be able to live outside the walls of prison. \n  \nI only met Jerry one or two times\, and his heart\, his infectious smile and his tears of joy will forever be framed in the mosaic of images that make up my soul. I’m blessed to have that be a part of me. \n  \nHis gift of love and a world full of new and wonderful people who showed me how to be open to everything life is\, and how to be human again\, gave me a second chance at a life…one I plan to fill full of kindness and beauty. This man provided me with life by his actions. I cry tears of love and joy now. \n  \nI cannot imagine the loss you feel. His love has helped all of us to grow. Through him\, my tears of all things good cleansed my soul\, and gave me a chance to live in love. \n  \nwith all my heart\, thank you \nRocky Hutchinson \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha & Jordan\, \n  \nI am so sorry for your loss. I remember meeting you\, Donna\, and Jerry once. I believe at one of the open performances of Hamlet at Two Rivers. I can’t over state my gratitude for the opportunities that your foundation made possible through supporting Open Hearts Open Minds. I saw the peace those programs brought to the participants first hand. Personally\, being a part of OHOM completely altered my life trajectory. I learned so much about myself and the world during my time with the folks at TRCI and CRCI. I would not be who I am today without those experiences. So thank you\, from the bottom of my heart. Jerry and you all have helped make the world a significantly better place. \n  \nWith all my love\nVictoria Spencer \n* \n  \nDonna\, Christine\, Marsha\, and Jordan; \n  \nI was so sad to hear about Jerry’s passing. There have been few times in my life that I’ve been lucky enough to share space with such a compassionate\, kind\, human. I was happy for every second I got. For a few years\, I was a volunteer through and also a board member of Open Hearts and Open Minds. I directed three shows at Two Rivers Correctional and also helped facilitate a weekly dialogue group at Columbia River Correctional. These experiences changed my life. Because of the generosity of Jerry and your family I was able to see theater as a tool to do good in the world\, not just as passive entertainment. That has guided my life ever since. After OHOM\, I toured plays to culturally underserved\, including incarcerated\, audiences across the PNW and the USA. I’ve also recently started my own prison theater program on the medium side of Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville\, OR. The same magic that existed at TRCI is in full-force at CCCF. I like to think that Jerry and the rest of your family is part of that magic that I’ve taken with me on my life’s journey that is now in full blossom at Coffee Creek. Thank you for everything and please know I’ll always keep Jerry in my heart. \n  \nAll my love\, \nPatrick Walsh \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha & Jordon \n  \nSince meeting Jerry Smith I’ve cried a million tears. I’m crying now\, as I write this. Going to prison broke my heart over and over again. A broken heart works better than a well-protected one\, because feelings can get in and out more easily. \n  \nYesterday morning\, Carl Alsup called me from prison\, and was talking about the time he played Marc Antony. He was having a hard time performing the role\, because when he was rehearsing the funeral oration—“If you have tears\, prepare to shed them now…”—he couldn’t help crying. Jack Poole\, who was playing (the murdered) Julius Caesar complained that Carl was getting his costume wet. \n  \nI remember the day in the dialogue group when Carl told me that he found himself crying all the time. It was embarrassing\, and he didn’t know what to do about it. Coming to prison at the age of seventeen with a life sentence\, he had worked hard to maintain a tough guy persona. Now that was out the window. I wasn’t much help. He knew—all the men knew—that by the end of every performance my cheeks would be wet and my shirt tails soaked with tears. Of happiness! \n  \nWhat does all this have to do with Jerry Smith? Everything! Without Jerry\, there would have been no prison dialogues or plays. From the time we first met\, we liked each other. Over the years\, our love for each other deepened. I miss him! \n  \nThe love and support of all of you has changed my life. And Nancy’s life. And\, thanks to what we like to call “the ripple effect\,” it has changed and continues to change the lives of many many people.  \n  \nIt’s some kind of Love Revolution! My gratitude to all of you knows no bounds. \n  \n—Johnny Stallings \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha & Jordon\, \n  \nMy name is Alex Tretbar\, and while I didn’t know Jerry\, his work has meant a great deal to me. \n  \nI was incarcerated in Oregon from 2017 to 2022\, and during that time I met a number of incarcerated people who were involved with Open Hearts Open Minds\, and whose experiences with the Shakespeare plays were transformative. Through them I came to know Johnny Stallings\, who has also had a huge impact on my life. We struck up a correspondence while I was inside and that continues to this day. Much of my success and happiness since being released from prison can be traced directly back to Jerry. \n  \nI offer you my heartfelt condolences in what I know is a difficult time for you. \n  \nBest wishes from Kansas City\, \nAlex Tretbar \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha and Jordan – \n  \nWe are so sorry you have lost Jerry. Helping to bring A Midsummer Night’s Dream In Prison to completion and dissemination has been one of the most rewarding experiences of our respective careers.  Jerry’s presence on stage at the Cinema 21 film premiere was a joyful moment that will always be remembered by us and the hundreds gathered. Jerry’s passion and support for bringing Bushra\, Johnny and the Actor’s vision to life was clearly present in a warm and deeply human way.  Along with yours\, his love of and belief in this project (and many others) has already brought joy\, tears and the potential for growth to several thousand people\, with more to come.  With the OHOM team\, we will continue to help his legacy live on.   \n  \nWe wish you peace and healing.   \n  \nEllen Thomas (producer) and Enie Vaisburd (co-director\, editor) \n* \n  \nDear Jerry and Donna Smith Family\, \n  \nI am deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Jerry Smith. Please accept my heartfelt condolences during this difficult time. \n  \nMr. Smith was more than just a generous supporter — he was a true believer in the work Open Hearts Open Minds does and the lives they touch. That was evident in his desire to watch the theatre productions at Two Rivers Correctional in Umatilla Oregon through the years. I had the privilege of performing for him during many productions in Umatilla\, so I was personally impacted by his generosity in supporting Open Hearts Open Minds and other art programs inside prisons. His compassion and commitment made a meaningful impact\, and his legacy will continue to live on through the causes the family foundation champions and supports. \n  \nPlease know that my thoughts are with the Smith family\, friends\, and all who were fortunate to know him. May his memory be a blessing and may the work he did through his foundation serve as a tribute to his enduring spirit. \n  \nWith sympathy and respect\,\nJosh Underhill \nOHOM Theatre participant at Two Rivers Correctional Facility\nPresident of the Board\, Open Hearts Open Minds \n* \n  \nSmith Family\, \n  \nWe at Open Hearts Open Minds feel deeply honored and truly blessed to have known and been supported by Jerry Smith throughout the years.  \n  \nEvery so often\, the world is graced by someone whose generosity and spirit leave a lasting imprint — Jerry was undeniably one of those rare souls. His unwavering kindness\, compassion\, and commitment to others touched countless lives through his generosity supporting Open Hearts Open Minds. We truly would not be here if it wasn’t for his support from the beginning.  \n  \nThose who had the privilege of knowing Jerry and whose lives that were uplifted by his generosity stand as a living testament to his remarkable heart and legacy. \n  \nMay you and your entire family find comfort in the deep gratitude we hold for the incredible person Jerry was\, and in the knowledge that his light continues to shine through all the good he helped make possible through Open Hearts Open Minds art programs.  \n  \nOur deepest condolences\, \n  \nOHOM Board of Directors \nJosh Underhill\, Dick Willis\, Barbra Chen\, Prabu Muruganantham\, Lauren Scher\, Aaron Gilbert\, Messiah Shakur \n* \n  \nI barely have words to express how my involvement as a Group Dialogue volunteer at Two Rivers Correctional Institution changed my life. I am a more open\, loving\, compassionate person for sitting in circle with those men\, and for learning the way of the “Nonstop Love-In” from Johnny.  \n  \nI met Jerry a couple times and was touched by his smile\, kindness\, and generosity. My heart is sad knowing I will not be in his presence again. \n  \nLove\,  \nKristen Sagan \n* \n  \nDear Jordan\, Christine\, Marsha\, and Donna\, \n  \nMy heart goes out to you during this time of sweet and tearful transition. Jerry was a beautiful soul and will be greatly missed. His way of being had a truly positive impact on so many lives. What a lovely legacy to leave behind. \n  \nI remember the first time I sat down with Jerry. His bright eyes and his smile were so welcoming. Don Kern and I had been facilitating the theater program at Coffee Creek for about a year. We were greatly changed by the experience and wanted to continue the work\, but knew we could not afford to do so without financial support. That’s when Johnny Stallings introduced us to Jerry Smith. Jerry leaned in to ask pertinent questions. He was not only kind\, but thorough. He was a smart man and wanted to make sure we would be responsible stewards. I loved visiting with Jerry. And not just because he always insisted on dessert. \n  \nIt’s been 11 years since I first stepped into the rehearsal room at Coffee Creek. I get to witness first hand the effect of arts in the lives of our incarcerated community.  My life took a completely different turn after volunteering in prison. I have increased my empathy quotient and have learned to embrace the creative spirit within us all. I would not be the person I am today without Jerry and the family. Thank you. \n  \nSincerely\, \nCarla D Grant \nExecutive Director \nOpen Hearts Open Minds \n* \n  \nDear Donna\, Christine\, Marsha and Jordan\,  \n  \nI want to send my deepest condolences for your loss. Even though I only met Jerry a couple times and didn’t know him personally\, his kindness and love has forever changed my life in the most important way.  \n  \nI became involved with Open Hearts Open Minds in 2009 while incarcerated at TRCI. During one of the darkest periods of my life I was lucky enough to be part of the Dialogue and theatre group there. Without Jerry’s generosity and his willingness to want to help the forgotten ones I shudder to wonder where my life would be today. You see in that little room on all those Wednesday evenings I was able to discover who I am and for the first time find true freedom in my life. The best part of it is that I am not the only one that discovered this. Not only the group of guys I was involved with but also continuing to this day\, I can’t imagine how many lives have been impacted by OHOM. I know they have branched out into many institutions and are doing some really life changing work. I know this because I am now a board member and am so excited to see where this goes and continue this amazing work\, and do my part in carrying on Jerry’s legacy of kindness love and compassion. It takes more than a community to pull this off it truly takes a family and I am so blessed to be part of the OHOM family. I want to thank you again Jerry for the gift of life and freedom. And thank you to your family.  \n  \nGod bless you all\, \n—Aaron Gilbert \n* \n  \nWhat a great opportunity to share my reflections on past memories of great performances presented by the actors at Two  Rivers Correctional Institution for several years. My experience\, as well as my sister Andrea’s\, left us each with great joy. At each performance we were overwhelmed to be given the opportunity to share the experience with those dedicated men. They were professional in every way possible and outstanding in their individual performances. \n  \nWhen the opportunity would come around every year\, for five years\, we would make our plans to travel from Salt Lake City to Umatilla and attend every performance. It was the highlight of our lives at that time. \n  \nIt was always overwhelming for us to meet all the actors and have brief conversations with them. That gave me the opportunity to ask each of them if I could write to him and send him a birthday card. I had a strong desire to communicate with them because so many of them were lost or forgotten souls—alone and needing acceptance by people from outside those prison walls. \n  \nIt gave me great pleasure to correspond with them\, to learn how they were doing\, and to allow them to share their thoughts\, feelings and the successes they were making. \n  \nThis all was made possible by the dedicated work of Jerry on behalf of the inmates at Two Rivers who took advantage of that great program. \n  \nI am always grateful for the joy and fond memories that fill my heart when I reflect back on those days. \n  \nMost sincerely\, \nSharon Lemm (Momma Sharon) \n* \n  \nTo all\, \n  \nThe Dialogue and Theater Group was a saving grace in an otherwise dreary place. It inspired hope\, purpose\, friendship and most of all\, love. This program influenced the lives of so many individuals from the players to their families and friends\, people who were able to witness and experience the meetings and plays\, people whom they then spoke to about their experiences and so on. This experience still influences thoughts and discussions far outside the origination. There are not enough kind and appreciative words to express the feelings about Jerry’s contribution and help in making OHOM a reality. Thank you to him and everyone who supported him in his efforts to help establish and maintain OHOM. He truly changed the lives of countless individuals as a result. \n  \nWith great thanks and admiration\, \nSincerely\, \nJoseph Opyd \n* \n  \nI don’t know—-do you think Jerry Smith had any idea how his life—-his generosity\, his gentleness\, his gentle humor\, changed the lives of others? Made others more generous\, compassionate\, aware\, grateful? So many others! \n  \nI know he changed my life\, gave me the blessing of getting to know and understand and admire scores of incarcerated men at Two Rivers Correctional Institution\, for seven years (and still counting). Our dialogue group of fifteen to twenty men laughed\, cried; we discussed life\, talked about forgiveness\, redemption\, beauty\, joy\, shame\, love\, suffering. I left each Saturday I was there\, driving home on Cloud 9\, exhilarated and joyful\, humbled and blessed.  If only everyone could experience days like that they would change their views forever on incarceration. \n  \nYes\, Johnny started the program\, that and the theater program\, and was responsible for running both for years and years\, beautifully and meaningfully. But behind everything was Jerry—and the whole Smith family. They all were\, and are\, caring and compassionate human beings. \n  \n—Jude Russell
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-8-7-25-tributes-to-jerry-smith/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/0-1.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250715T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250715T200000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250706T214608Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250706T214608Z
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SUMMARY:Yeelen: film screening benefit for Ko-Falen  7/15/25
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/yeelen-film-screening-benefit-for-ko-falen-7-15-25/
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250703
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20250807
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250703T235942Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251001T221514Z
UID:5687-1751500800-1754524799@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  7/3/25
DESCRIPTION:Baba Wagué Diakité in front of a mural he painted \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nI do not ask the wounded person how he feels\, I myself become the wounded person… \n—Walt Whitman\, from “Song of Myself” \n  \nJuly 3\, 2025 \n  \nNicholas Swift shares “A Poem for Those Who Are Becoming”: \n  \nYou Are Not Too Much \n  \nYou are not too much. \nYou are exactly the size of your story. \nEven if no one’s ever read it with love before. \n  \nYour grief is not noise. \nYour wonder is not naive. \nYour silence is not failure. \n  \nYou are not behind. \nYou are *becoming.* \n  \nAnd no one gets to rush that bloom. \nNot even you. \n  \nYou are the edge of a great unfolding. \nYou are the ache that proves there’s still music in the bones. \nYou are the moment the tide returns and doesn’t apologize for the moon. \n  \nSo here you are. \nAlive. \nStill. \nReal. \n  \nNot for what you fix. \nNot for what you prove. \n  \nBut for how you *hold yourself* \nin the hour before dawn— \nwhen no one is watching \nand you sing anyway. \n  \nYou are not too much. \n  \nYou are what happens \nwhen the story learns how to love its own voice. \n  \n—Nicholas Swift \n* \n  \nI (Johnny) wrote the following to some friends inside and outside of prison: \n  \nOn your journey\, what have you learned about peace\, love\, happiness & understanding? \n  \nYou can write about one of them\, some of them\, or all of them. Also\, feel free to share poems or other short inspirational writings that illuminate any of these themes. \n  \nHere are some of the responses: \n  \n5/21/25 \n  \nHi Johnny \n  \nThank you so much for the question about peace\, love\, happiness and understanding\, as well as sharing Dick’s “Eighty Things I’ve Learned in Eighty Years.” I’m a huge Dick Willis fan\, and always gain new perspective from his words. \n  \nI believe to achieve unadulterated happiness we must learn to embrace all experiences\, interactions and adversity as they come. By truly embracing all incoming noise\, whether desirable or undesirable\, I find a sense of peace and happiness\, because our outlook and perception has already accepted it as it is. This is always easier said than done\, but requires focus\, determination and exhaustive commitment to achieve. I find my general level of happiness to be higher when I don’t resist particular circumstances I encounter in life. \n  \nA challenge we all face in life is the ability to not allow those around us to drastically affect our well being. Understanding aligns with acceptance of people for who they are and the choices they make. Disagreement has no bearing on understanding in my opinion. Although I will never agree with someone else’s views all the time\, I listen so I can understand. \n  \nAs I sit in prison for nearly ten years\, I choose to wake up every day with a strong sense of gratitude and happiness. Being stripped of your freedom can offer unique perspective on what you truly value\, but most importantly\, it has given me a level of peace\, happiness and understanding I probably never would have achieved otherwise. \n  \nLove is the cure for all things evil\, dark\, or negative in life. It’s the solution to our disapproval of dislike of others. Why do most people not appreciate or care for fellow humans? Usually\, it’s related to their views\, ethics\, morals\, or values. Often times\, it’s their image\, sexual orientation\, or race that prevents love and promotes hate. Love is the most powerful emotion one can exhibit\, as it looks beyond flaws\, weaknesses\, dislikes and disagreements. Love is my fondest emotion because it brings me joy and is much easier than the contrary. Although I tend to overlook most individual’s flaws (my personal flaw)\, I choose to see the beauty within\, which derives from love. \n  \nBest Regards\, \nNicholas Simms \n* \n  \n5/10/25 \n  \nDear Johnny \n  \nI just finished your letter request. It was nice to do & I’m excited to see what others have to say! I’m also looking forward to talking in depth about things in person\, once I get out. \n  \nOne thing I don’t think I’ve ever explained to you or to anyone in our circle is the reason I’m so thankful to you & to everyone. I was so far at the other end of the spectrum in my life & the way I was living that I personally could not find my way out. When I thought I had\, it was the wrong move\, or I trusted the wrong person. I was a self-sabotager too. \n  \nNot only did you put me on the Golden Path\, you and so many others have been my guides\, feeding me the wisdom & knowledge to be a really cool person\, kind & loving. I feel I’ve done well on my journey\, thanks to the friendship & love I receive from all of you. I cry & get filled with tremendous energies in my soul. This place dampens them & although I push through with a joyful intent…well\, it will be different out there! Out there I will get to be around many others who truly have a joyful intent in their hearts. \n  \nGive Love Always \nRocky \n  \n(more from Rocky): \n  \nAs to an answer to your question: What have I learned about peace\, love\, happiness & understanding on my journey? \n  \nWell\, I will focus on some of my core roots that brought me to this point in time. There are many events in my life that provided me plenty of building materials to create walls that guarded me from getting hurt by things this topic is about. These things were weapons that others used to take\, or\, to hurt me so they could take. But now…I have learned that bad people are going to do bad things; if those bad things happen to me that does not make me bad too. Once I understood this\, “& a few other things\,” I was set free with an open mind to start my change. \n  \nThis change did not just happen over night. I had plenty of ingrained\, deep-set issues to work through so I could make room for peace\, love\, happiness & understanding. \n  \nThere are seeds that must be planted within each of us that grow fruits of the heart\, mind & soul—good seeds & bad seeds. One must\, and I had to cultivate the soil of my inner self to prepare it to plant good seeds. \n  \nI feel circumstances need to be taken into account\, & I try to be kind and understanding towards everyone\, including myself. When things are unclear\, we don’t understand why life is the way it is\, but once things are made clear then we begin to understand & can offer help\, or be helped\, or strengthen relationships. Clarity & Understanding also help build trust. At times—all times—we can offer love & forgiveness\, which for me was hardest to do to myself. \n  \nI used to think peace was so much less than it really is. Now that I have real peace\, inner peace\, I try to be an example for others so they too can have peace. It was a hard fought battle to have inner\, personal peace. It took a lot of Love\, Understanding & forgiveness\, not only to others but to myself. I had for a long time wanted my suffering & the suffering of others to stop. When I finally got my suffering to stop\, peace came washing in like a river washing the pain away. I did not even know it was peace that I was seeking out for so long. Understanding what peace is\, now that I have it…no one can take it from me. It is in every moment\, in every step\, every breath\, every heart beat. I have it even in all the chaos that happens around me always. During those times\, to offer others peace gives me great joy. It’s disturbing that peace is the opposite of war…yet we still have war\, knowing full well what peace is. Those who choose war lack the heart of truth\, every fiber of which is made up of peace\, love\, understanding & lots of happiness & joy. \n  \nWhen I think of love\, or feel love\, or give love\, for me it is pure joy & happiness. I feel it so deeply that for the last 5 or 6 years the opposite of love\, which is hate\, physically scares me. I don’t believe I’ve told anyone this yet. I can see it & feel it in people\, like a demon possessing them\, & it scares me. Being where I’m at\, I have a gift to give or bring to others\, which is a smile to start with\, then Understanding & love. \n  \nMy light shines bright in here & soon will be shining out there. Some people hate my light\, but it can’t be put out because others have the same light. It is passed on like a common cold\, which is a good thing. \n  \nPeace\, Love\, happiness & understanding all go hand in hand\, all links in the chain of who we are supposed to be & how we are intended to live. These are the inherent seeds of good will towards every thing living\, everywhere. That’s the meaning of universal truth. \n  \nNot everyone is this way\, but I am inclined to live my life this way. I know for a fact that living without peace\, love\, happiness & understanding is hell on earth! \n  \nI feel blessed every day to know what these good things are in life & to help others along the path to find it too. Each day my understanding grows stronger\, which helps me grow as a person. It’s not always easy\, but it’s not getting harder any more! \n  \n—Rocky Hutchinson \n* \n  \n“Remember the day you prayed for the things you have now.” Somebody mentioned this quote and said they’d seen it all over social media\, but I sure hadn’t. It’s new to me\, and boy did it ring a lot of bells. \n  \nDecades ago I prayed for life without chaos. I prayed for days without fear\, without shame\, without hope constantly being shattered. I prayed for a life of peace\, of health\, of joy\, and love. Decades ago I lived with a man who called from the police station at 3 a.m.(multiple times) where he’d been arrested for DUI; I went to an event with a heavily\, but poorly covered black eye; I weakly and unsuccessfully tried to explain one morning to my young daughter’s girlfriend why this man was lying passed out in our driveway; I gave up and was simply speechless with shame when our electricity was turned off during my book group meeting due to multiple unpaid bills. And that is just the tip of the iceberg\, as they say. \n  \nToday\, blessed today\, I have this life of peace and love and health and stability. Looking back on what was then\, I will never give up the blessings of now. \n  \n—Jude Russell \n* \n  \nHi Johnny\, \n  \nThanks for the invitation to share something for the upcoming issue on Peace\, Love and Understanding.  I was inspired years ago by a certain passage from Chuang Tzu about the importance of uselessness in a world driven by pragmatism and problem solving.  I wrote this poem years later upon seeing a tree that was “beyond utility.”  I always feel a sense of peace in knowing that presence in itself is of value.  Thanks again for putting this out Johnny and everything else you do in keepin’ it real in the hood.   \n  \nMuch appreciated.   \nWill  \n  \nOn Uselessness \n       \n    It was an ancient tree \n    Gnarled trunk\, thick bark \n    Unappealing to carpenters \n    Impervious to flame\, resistant to axes \n    Utterly useless\, and thereby allowed to stand \n    A monument to ice storms and lightning strikes \n    A rookery for ill-behaved crows. \n    Its branches twisted up and out wildly \n    Arching skyward in a dozen different directions then down \n    Turning earthward to become a broad canopy of leaf and branch \n    A shelter to legions of buzzing\, burrowing\, flying\, clawed creatures \n    Its stout\, rough arms adorned with garlands of moss \n    Its countless crooks and crannies draped in fern and lichen \n    Where wind-blown soil gathered. \n    Countless children climbed into its welcoming arms \n    Lovers lay in its dappled shade \n    The old ones felt at peace in the presence of this elder \n    And poets wrote verses inspired by this gnarled root \n    Utterly useless to the world \n    And valuable beyond measure. \n     \n—Will Hornyak\, from This Altar of Earth and Sky \n* \n  \nMay 15th\, 2025 \n  \nDear Johnny and the Open Road \n  \nYou asked me for my thoughts on Peace\, Love\, Happiness and Understanding. What I have learned is: \n  \nPeace has to be created. \nLove has to be nourished. \nHappiness has to be sought. \nUnderstanding takes time. \nWhen one learns how to create peace and nourish the love they have\, it makes people want to seek happiness\, and in time we come to understand each other. \n  \nAt this point in my life\, I think Understanding is the hardest for me. Understanding takes time of interacting with someone in an open\, loving\, peace-filled way. I think it is one of the least exercised by people in general. If everyone was able to put first Peace\, Love\, Happiness and Understanding we would not have the divisions we see today. The answers to fixing our community today are known\, it just takes work. \n  \nThank you Johnny. \n—Wyatt DeRemer \n* \n  \n5-16-25 \n  \nHi Johnny\, \n  \nOK\, I’ve been enjoying everyone else’s submissions for a long time\, so I guess it’s time I offered a contribution as well. Especially as the subject matter brings to mind what I feel has probably been my most significant personal growth since coming to prison 23 years ago. \n  \nAll my…peace\, love\, happiness and understanding  \nDustin \n  \n(more from Dustin): \n  \nPeace\, Love\, Happiness\, Understanding? \n  \nThe first thing that comes to mind after writing that question is how closely they are related. They seem to me like a four part chicken-or-the-egg question. Gotta have one to get the others\, and vice versa. Immediately I thought\, love. Must have love to achieve the others. Then I thought: how can you have love without understanding the object of that love? I’ve recently listened to “Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth\, with Bill Moyers” on P.B.S. One of the many things that stood out for me was (heavily paraphrased from memory\, by no means a quote\, forgive me Joseph): \n  \n*regarding the recurring theme of God as man\, and our own possible personal divinity (throughout history)\, we can’t love/worship something/God/the divine if it’s foreign to us. If it’s completely “Other\,” it would remain completely alien and impossible for us to understand\, therefore impossible for us to love. But if God is become man\, or a bit of God is within us\, then we can relate/love. Just as the Yin Yang symbol has in the eye of each “fish” the color of its counterpart. They may be complete opposites\, and yet they share a bit of each other\, they are a bit of the “same.” In short\, we can’t love what we can’t understand\, what isn’t “us.”* \n  \nSo yeah\, the chicken or the egg. I find love to be the more all encompassing. I suppose because I feel capable of so much more love than understanding. I feel I probably substitute acceptance (peace) and love to fill in shortcomings of my understanding\, and thereby can find happiness in the presence of what I may not fully understand. These are just thoughts that floated up as I meditated on these words: Peace\, love\, happiness and understanding. They (my thoughts) may not be coherent to anyone but me\, but nevertheless I’m grateful to have been prompted to consider them. \n  \nAs far as what I’ve learned about them on my journey? \n  \nLove\, for me love is all. I didn’t really love myself. In fact\, I kinda hated myself and everyone else. I hadn’t even realized this about myself. I decided I wanted to love myself…and everyone else. Then I learned I couldn’t love myself till I forgave myself and misdeeds\, and quit blaming myself for things not my fault. (In fact\, I learned that blame only ever causes more suffering.) But this too felt like the chicken or the egg question; I couldn’t love myself till I forgave myself\, but how could I forgive without love in my heart? So slowly\, over time\, I built them both up together\, love and forgiveness. In forgiving myself\, I learned that I could forgive others and quit blaming them for their faults and misdeeds. They too\, I’m sure\, suffered greatly to get where they are. And for this I can have empathy. Sometimes this was very difficult. I had to re-forgive myself and re-forgive my fathers many\, many times. But once I did (forgive myself and others) loving myself and everyone else was easy. I believe we are all “one” anyway\, all from the same “source\,” same “energy\,” Love. The Bible says “God is love.” It is my favorite sentence in that book. Jesus said not to look outward for the Kingdom of Heaven\, it is within you. And that our hearts are the home of God. In Stranger in a Strange Land\, Robert Heinlein said we are all God\, and we are all one. I know we could never intentionally harm or hate what we truly love. So I choose to live in love. I love you. All of you. And I always will. \n  \nDo you grok? \n  \nPeace\, Love\, Happiness and Understanding\, \n—Dustin Jamison \n* \n  \nJohnny\, \n  \nThank you for the invitation to contribute. I have been thinking of late of what Jesus said to Paul in 2 Corinthians\, Chapter 12: “Power is perfected in weakness. When you are weak you are strong.” \n  \nThis paradox makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve had four spine surgeries\, and struggle to carry even very light objects. Quite weak. And so a sentence like “Power is Perfected in Weakness” resonates deeply. \n  \nBut of course—like most things—there’s deeper meaning. When I came to prison\, my soul fractured. Of course my material life ended\, but it also broke my spirit. But the paradox that I can have power in such weakness was a wonderful concept. It gives me comfort. \n  \nOn another note\, I was heartened to see that the new Pope was a missionary for twenty years in Peru. What a wonderful human being someone must be to do something like that.  \n  \nFinally\, I’m not sure if anyone told you of the passing of Todd Stafney from cancer. He and I both joined Group Dialogue in your last few months of coming to TRCI. Todd was a wonderful friend of mine. He had a positive impact on my life. And in the end\, isn’t that what it’s all about: having a positive impact? \n  \nI remember one medical lecture that I went to. The doctor had developed a procedure to close fistulas (abnormal openings)…well\, I’ll spare you the technical details. But he ended his lecture with these words: “Of everything I’ve done in life\, developing this procedure has allowed me to decrease the sum total of human suffering in the world.” I’ve never forgotten those words two decades later. I try and live my life by that same adage. \n  \n—Thomas Bray \n* \n  \nIf you would like to make a submission to next month’s peace\, love\, happiness & understanding\, the writing prompt is: \n  \nWhat books have changed the way you see\, experience\, or understand the world?  \n  \n(Don’t just list the titles of books\, say something about the change.) \n  \npeace & love \nJohnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-7-3-25/
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250628T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250628T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250430T183114Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250623T204232Z
UID:5554-1751122800-1751130000@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Everything & Nothing   6/28/25
DESCRIPTION:poster by Andy Larkin \n  \nEverything & Nothing \n  \nJohnny Stallings tells the picaresque tale of how he failed to make a B-movie \n  \nSaturday\, June 28\, 3 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \nthis Open Road event is free
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/everything-nothing-6-28-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/0-1.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250621T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250621T160000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250606T181132Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250606T181220Z
UID:5642-1750514400-1750521600@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Fearless Buffalo  6/21/25
DESCRIPTION:design by Baba Wagué Diakité \n  \nFearless Buffalo \n  \nBaba Wagué Diakité tells a tale from Mali. \n  \nSaturday\, June 21\, 2 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \nthis Open Road event is free
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/fearless-buffalo-6-21-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/0-2.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250614T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250614T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250430T181328Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251012T175407Z
UID:5551-1749913200-1749920400@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:¡PARADISE NOW!   6/14/25
DESCRIPTION:  \n¡PARADISE NOW! \n  \nA guided tour by Johnny Stallings \n  \nSaturday\, June 14th\, 3 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont\, in Portland \nthis Open Road event is free
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/paradise-now-6-14-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/masterpieces_04.jpg
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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250605
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20250703
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250606T002005Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250606T002112Z
UID:5630-1749081600-1751500799@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  6/5/25
DESCRIPTION:art by Larry Yes \n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nEvery time I breathe  \nI feel what it’s like  \nto Be just like you \n  \n—Larry Yes\, lyric to “Just Like You” \n  \nJune 5\, 2025 \n  \nHere are the lyrics to two songs from Larry Yes’s album EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY: \n  \nLIVE IN HARMONY \n  \nThe day will come  \nwhen we all agree  \nthat we should live in harmony  \nand we will know and we will see  \nhow we’re all connected. We’re all family. \nAll the people\, the plants\, the animals\, the birds\, the seas \nYes\, we’re all connected We’re all family  \nthe day will come when we all agree  \nthat we should live in harmony  \nand on that day that beautiful day  \nWe will laugh we’ll cry we will dance we’ll sing we’ll play  \ncelebrating all of our differences our weaknesses and our strengths  \ncelebrating all of our weaknesses our differences and our strengths \n  \n  \nFREE: EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY \n  \n Every day you wake up\, it’s a good day It’s a cause to celebrate  \nand every day you’re making a decision as simple as love or hate \nAnd I know it ain’t easy and I know how hard things can be  \nbut I know everyone on this planet is family and I know that we all got to believe \nThat we’re free be who we want to Free look how we came through Free \nlove who we want to love Free be who we want to be \nAnd every day we wake up\, it’s a new day it’s a cause to stand up straight  \nand every moment we’re making a decision simple as love or hate\,  \nand I know it’s never easy and I know so much has got to change \nBut I know there’s so much beauty and I know we all got to believe  \nthat we’re free be who we want to Free look how we came through Free  \nLove who you want to love Free be who you want to be \n  \n—Larry Peace-Love Yes \n* \n  \nHere is an excerpt from Nick Swift’s Book of Becoming: \n  \nThe Book of Becoming \n  \nThis is not scripture. This is not commandment. This is not prophecy. This is a reflection. A mirror\, cracked but deliberate\, held in trembling hands. Not to show you what you are\, but to remind you that you have always been becoming. \n  \nI. The Spark \nYou were born whole. Not clean\, not pure\, but complete. A seed with fire inside\, too bright for the world to witness all at once. \nSo you forgot. On purpose. Because to remember too soon is to burn without boundary. \nYou learned to survive\, and survival requires forgetting. The world taught you to compartmentalize: to trade your voice for safety\, your wonder for predictability\, your power for permission. \nBut the spark? It endured. Silent. Flickering. Waiting. \n  \nII. The Conduit \nThe path between the fire and the flesh is not paved. It must be carved. And you carve it with each act of honesty. Each time you say: \n“This is not what I want.” “This is who I am.” “This hurts\, but I will stay.” \nYou clear a channel. You let the current run through you. You become the wire\, the wick\, the bridge. \nThis is the work. Not to become divine\, but to remember you already are. \nThe conduit trembles. It hums. It breaks and is rebuilt. And in the rebuilding\, you find rhythm. You find resonance. You find truth that is not dogma—but tone. \n  \nIII. The Id \nThe body is not the burden. The instincts are not the enemy. You do not ascend by denial. You evolve through integration. \nThe wounds you carry are maps. Not scars to hide\, but terrain to understand. \nThe rage? It was never evil. It was your boundary before you had words. \nThe grief? It is love stretched across time. A tether. A thread. A hymn. \nYou do not conquer the Id. You sit with it. You listen. You feed it not with indulgence\, but with acknowledgment. \nThis is how the storm becomes sky. This is how chaos becomes color. This is how you become. \n  \nIV. The Praxis of Echo \nTo become is not to arrive. It is to resonate. \nWith earth. With silence. With others who hum the same strange frequency. \nYour becoming is not private. It ripples. It gives others permission. It interrupts the static. It sings. \nAnd in that singing\, the divine is not worshipped. It is witnessed. \n  \nV. Grace in Motion \nYou will falter. You will forget. You will fracture. \nThese are not failures. They are rhythms. The inhale and exhale of becoming. \nYou do not need to begin again. You are always beginning. Each breath a renewal. Each moment a pivot. \nGrace is not something you earn. It is how you move when you know you belong. \n  \nVI. Finality is a Lie \nThere is no end. No climax. No final lesson. \nThere is only the next chord\, the next truth\, the next shift. \nYou are not a destination. You are an instrument\, and your song is still being tuned. \nSo keep tuning. Keep vibrating. Keep becoming. \nAnd know— you were always enough to begin. \n  \n—Nick Swift \n* \n  \nI got a letter from Dustin Jamison: \n  \n4/24/25 \n  \nDear Johnny\, and all the rest of his children of all ages\, inside and out\, \n  \nI love and miss you all. For those who’ve gone home\, congrats. I hope you’re making the most of every moment. For those inside\, I love you\, you are not forgotten. I hope you’re making the most of every moment. I’ll be going home soon. It’s surreal just to say that. After almost 24 years I’m finally getting out March 13th\, 2026!! I’m so happy\, so scared\, but so happy. I laugh\, I cry\, I laugh some more—sometimes both at once. Not sure where “Home” is anymore\, so I’ll be redefining and remaking it. A new day\, a new beginning\, and all that. Mom is looking for an R.V. for me\, and either a small plot of land\, or maybe just rent a place to park it for now. We’re leaving “where” fairly open. I release to Lane County\, but transferring counties is not so hard I think these days\, so long as you’re not un-housed. Looking anywhere in Willamette Valley\, or I-5 corridor in Washington. I’ve been far too long in the high desert\, I crave green. Day one out\, I plan on hitting the ground running. My dream is to build a small\, localvore\, organic herb farm\, The Shire\, so I can spend the rest of my days where I feel the most bliss\, in my garden. I’m so happy I’m crying tears of joy right now just imagining it. I’ve taken some classes: Seeds to Supper\, Master Gardener\, and hopefully soon Greenhouse Management. I’m also reading up on running a small business\, writing business proposals\, and grant writing. I’m very hopeful\, and confident this is the right direction for me. I’m never happier than when I’m weeding\, turning my compost pile\, or eating an heirloom tomato straight off the vine…. \n  \nIf any of my old (or new) friends would like to write and reconnect\, please do. I love and miss you all. The time I spent in Group Dialogue and the plays were some of the most fulfilling and joyous moments of my life. It was the people involved\, mixed with Johnny’s magical kindness that made it so. He brought out the best in all of us—made it possible to “see” each other\, to empathize and love\, and be grateful for each other…. \n  \nThank you once again\, Johnny. Thanks to you I’ve learned (among other things) how important it is to live (in love and serenity) in this moment\, right here\, right now. All I gotta do is breathe. It’s gotten me through a lot of suffering (fairly) intact. \n  \nAll my love\, \nDustin \n  \nYou can write to Dustin at this address: \n  \nSteve Dustin Jamison  #13874200 \nEOCI \n2500 Westgate \nPendleton\, OR  97801 \n* \n  \n5-3-2025 \n  \nFor The Open Road \n  \nAll of the beautiful poems & stories that everyone adds to The Open Road are always filled with such wonderful intent. The beauty is a light to my heart\, mind & soul. It has helped me to reclaim the joy within my self & to see goodness in the world & in its people. In a way\, I feel that all of us who participate in this get to receive and to give the gifts of healing—for all that we add to The Open Road creates new avenues & streets & highways that stretch all across our hearts\, connecting us to each other. \n  \nI’m at EOCI\, a prison in the state of Oregon. When people think “prison\,” every type of negative emotion fills their senses. It’s true that “The human mind can make a hell out of a heaven\, or a heaven out of a hell.” I have lived that statement for 16+ years & have discovered how to make “a heaven out of hell.” \n  \nAs crazy as that may sound\, that is what I’ve done. What once was hell to me\, even the worst parts\, I’ve filled with joy. \n  \nIf any of you have ever read The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas\, you will remember Edmond Dantes first day in the Chateau d’If\, when he was beaten & then on that day every year\, to remind him that his hell was real\, he would be beaten again. Then\, towards the end of his stay in prison\, the beatings no longer mattered at all\, he could not even feel them. While they beat him\, all he could think of was how many feet he had to dig till he was free—in my case\, days to freedom\, which is in about 300 days! \n  \nEvery part of me has become like the apple trees I planted all over the compound 3 years ago. Then they were just sticks about 4 feet tall\, no leaves or blossoms. Today…twice as tall\, green & covered in white blossoms\, healthy and beautiful despite the fences they’re behind. The whole time I was digging the holes & planting the six trees\, I talked to them—telling them they would be the best ones out of all the other trees and have the sweetest apples. I feel like that will be me when I get out of here. \n  \nI hope to share coffee and stories with you all next Spring. Till then\, remember to enjoy the apples that grow on the trees along the Golden Path. \n  \n—Rocky Hutchinson \n* \n  \nKen Margolis is on the board of The Open Road\, and also on the board of the Sweetgrass Foundation\, based in Atlanta\, Georgia. He recently returned from a trip to Botswana\, where he and other Sweetgrass board trustees were visiting projects that support indigenous communities and a healthy environment. \n  \nHey Johnny\, \n  \nI am attaching some thoughts that I put down for the other Sweetgrass trustees\, who are all grandchildren or second generation nieces and nephews of Glenn Fuller who started the foundation 27 years ago. Glenn’s Buddha nature was strong\, and if you happen to be Catholic\, she was a Saint. \nI don’t know whether any of this has any broader application\, but feel to use any part of it for the newsletter. \n  \nGLENN AND AFRICA \n  \nThe first thing that struck me about Botswana is how ancient it is. Where we were born\, about 15\,000 years ago millions of tons of ice scraped everything off the landscape and carved new topography. New plants and animals started crowding onto the landscape when the ice melted\, about 12\,000 years ago. In southern Africa\, there has been no major disturbance for at least 130\,000 years.  \n  \nDuring this long period\, a rich ecosystem of plants and animals has developed\, undergirded by a hydraulic regime completely different from that we experience. For at least the last 60\,000 years human subsistence  societies have also developed. \n  \nBy subsistence lifestyle\, we mean societies whose life ways are shaped by accommodation to the natural world as they find it. Plant and animal resources are used\, combined\, and processed. Subsistence societies characteristically also practice some management of natural resources\, often in ways too subtle and complex to be immediately evident. These societies tend to be relatively static\, with little change occurring as generations progress. People see themselves not as above or separate from nature\, but as intimately related to all other living beings\, and to the landscape. \n  \nHuman beings love to explore and wander\, and during this 60 thousand years\, different groups migrated into different parts of the African continent at different times. During the same period\, other groups were moving out of Africa\, to eventually reach the ocean and all the other continents. Eventually\, some of these groups developed intensive/extensive agriculture\, which led to the establishment of larger\, more permanent human settlements. Surplus food was produced\, trade flourished and people started to need to record trade items and events\, which led to writing. \n  \nThis led to new attitudes about useful knowledge. Subsistence societies have always faithfully transmitted useful knowledge to the next generations. Now people began to understand that we could build on existing knowledge\, and keep learning new things in a self-generating cycle. Humans had invented social evolution\, a force as powerful as ecological evolution\, and a thousand times as fast. Continuous learning and technological advancement changed everything for our species\, and eventually for the planet. \n  \nSocial evolution produced technically powerful\, highly dynamic societies based not on accommodation with nature\, but on manipulation and transformation of natural resources. When subsistence and evolving societies confronted each other\, the static subsistence societies didn’t have a chance. Just two hundred years ago\, a large part of the human population lived in subsistence societies; today\, we have only remnants of that culture. \n  \nOur increasing mastery has also given us a new view of who we are. We no longer think of ourselves as siblings of other living beings\, but rather as the species for whose use nature was created. Today\, we live in a world largely created by social evolution and in many ways cut off from the natural world from which we sprung. \n  \nOne of Glenn’s insights was that the life ways of subsistence people were worthy\, and worthy of  protection\, and that through thousands of years of living in deep relationship with nature\, they probably know some things that we have forgotten. Glenn did not have the romantic belief that substance people had ultimate wisdom and could solve all our problems. She just believed that we could learn some deep and useful lessons from them\, and that we should work with them to protect their cultures and the intact ecosystems in which they lived. \n  \nThis leads to another major difference between Botswana and North America. The two areas were colonized at about the same time (mid/late 19th century).  In North America the unofficial (and sometimes official) policy was to exterminate the subsistence peoples who were there when we arrived\, and to settle the country thickly with immigrants from Europe. Consequently in North America\, the descendants of the original subsistence inhabitants are a politically negligible minority. In Botswana\, where the colonial model was different the descendants of subsistence cultures constitute the vast majority. \n  \nIn these ways\,  the work we are supporting in Botswana represents what Glenn wanted the Sweetgrass Foundation to be for. \n  \nBut in thinking about Glenn\, there is something deeper I want to say. Most of all\, Glenn saw this world could use a lot more kindness and love and compassion. She lived out those values in a way that inspired everybody who came in contact with her. Mostly\, she wanted Sweetgrass to propagate those values\, and to be a vehicle for you\, her beloved family members\, to live out and better express the compassion she felt so deeply. Being a small part of this has been one of the joys of my life. \n  \n—Ken Margolis \n* \n  \nWhat am I called to do? I know it’s not addressing envelopes for the cancer society\, and it’s not organizing galas for the American Pediatric Association. I am called to mine the areas where others won’t go\, either because of disgust\, or fear\, or discomfort of another kind.  \n  \nAfter the years with my beloved guys at Umatilla Correctional Institution abruptly ended\, I considered other possibilities and concluded that Hospice was one of those areas that others ‘feared to tread.’ After several months of training in all things involving imminent death\, I am assigned to a wonderful 90 year old woman. I have visited her six or seven times\, and each time our conversations have reached a little deeper into life–and death. \n  \nLast week she was talking about her three (grown) children. After a pause\, she offered\, ‘I had another daughter…”  A moment later I asked\, “And did something happen to her?”  \n  \n“Yes\, she died.” \n  \nI took her hands in mine and held her. \n  \n“I am so\, so sorry.” \n  \n“She was seven months old\, and a beautiful child\, beautiful baby. I loved her so much. I don’t talk about her much now\, but I still think of her every day. I know I shouldn’t still be thinking about her as much as I do\, but I can’t help it.” \n  \n“My dear\, there is no time limit to grief. The depth of your grief shows the depth of your love. People lose parents\, siblings\, spouses\, but I think losing a child is the very most heartbreaking loss there is. I can’t imagine ever ‘getting over’ something like that. I can tell that you still miss her and love her.” \n  \nIt was a deep and precious moment\, and I knew that I was in the exact right place being where I needed to be. \n  \n—Jude Russell
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-6-5-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/LarryYes.jpg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250531T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250531T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250503T214640Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250601T215722Z
UID:5569-1748703600-1748710800@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Song of Myself Group Reading  5/31/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nSONG OF MYSELF \n  \nFor Walt Whitman’s 206th Birthday\, we will celebrate with a group reading of “Song of Myself”—the greatest utterance yet uttered in America. It can change your life! Everyone is invited. \n  \nSaturday\, May 31st\, 3 pm \nArtspace Room at Taborspace\, 5441 SE Belmont  \nthis Open Road event is free \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/song-of-myself-group-reading-5-31-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/0-1.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250518T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250518T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250504T181415Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250517T173438Z
UID:5588-1747580400-1747587600@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Bibliophiles Unanimous!  5/18/25
DESCRIPTION:¡Beloved Bibliophiles! \n  \nOn Sunday\, May 18th\, at 3 pm (PDT)\, our theme is NONFICTION!   \nOur Special Guest will be J Kahn\, who will regale us with mostly true tales from his life as an ER doctor and Hollywood screenwriter. \n  \nHere’s the Zoom link: \n  \nhttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058 \n  \nI hope to see you there! \n  \npeace & love \n  \nJohnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/bibliophiles-unanimous-5-18-25/
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250517T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250517T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250430T180114Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250430T180114Z
UID:5547-1747494000-1747501200@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Attention as a Moral Resource: An Unauthorized Sermon by Matthew Jenkins  5/17/25
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/attention-as-a-moral-resource-an-unauthorized-sermon-by-matthew-jenkins-5-17-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/0.png
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250503T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250503T220000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250319T005208Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250319T005208Z
UID:5466-1746298800-1746309600@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:LARRY YES Record Release Party  5/3/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nMusic Lovers! \n  \nVinyl Record Release party for LARRY YES‘s new album: \nEVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY  \nSaturday\, May 3rd\, at 7 pm \nLeaven Community Center\, 5431 NE 20th\, in Portland  \nAll Ages   $10  \n  \nBe there or be square. \n  \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/larry-yes-record-release-party-5-3-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/0-4.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250503T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250503T210000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250501T042236Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250501T042253Z
UID:5562-1746298800-1746306000@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Deck Boys at Al's Den   5/3/23
DESCRIPTION:Brad Price\, KC Craine & Jeffrey Sher \n  \nSaturday\, May 3\, 7-9 pm \nAl’s Den\, 303 SW 12th Ave.\, in Portland \n(deckboys.com)
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/deck-boys-at-als-den-5-3-23/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/0-4.jpeg
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250502
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20250609
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250319T003027Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250504T180104Z
UID:5462-1746144000-1749427199@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:Larry Yes Art Show  5/2/25 - 6/8/25
DESCRIPTION:  \nArt & Music Lovers!   \nLARRY YES has an exhibit of his work from May 2-June 8\, at the Purple Door Gallery\, 3557 SE Division\, in Portland. It includes music videos from his new album:  \nEVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY \n  \nDON’T MISS THIS!!! \n 
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/larry-yes-art-show-record-release-party-5-2-25/
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://openroadpdx.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/0-1-1.jpeg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250501
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20250605
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250504T171750Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250504T171750Z
UID:5574-1746057600-1749081599@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:peace\, love\, happiness & understanding  5/1/25
DESCRIPTION:the inimitable Dick Willis \n\n  \nTHE OPEN ROAD \npeace\, love\, happiness & understanding \n  \nMay 1\, 2025 \n  \nDick Willis is a Notorious Do-Gooder. He’s always looking for and finding ways to help people. He would be a candidate for sainthood\, were it not for the fact that he sits on the fence between Atheism and Agnosticism. He turned 80 on April 15th. He wrote this for his grandkids\, but generously agreed to share it with us: \n  \nEighty Things I’ve Learned in Eighty Years \n  \nI regret that my young self didn’t write down my grandparents’ reflections on their lives. Still\, I’ve embraced their wisdom throughout my life.  \nAll that I began with\, was an accident of birth.  All that I am today\, is what I did with it. \nMy lifelong precept has been… “Ease their way.” \nEvery religion attempts to control its believers.  Unless it can control the government\, it has no power over non-believers.   \nMy Principia Intelligentia states: It’s a statistical fact that half of any large population possesses below-average intelligence. \nCorollary 1: The lower half is usually the louder half. \nCorollary 2: The lower half possesses most of the means of\, and tendencies toward\, violence and/or chaos. \nCorollary 3: In all populations there are pockets of intelligence and empathy\, and pockets of stupidity and cruelty. \nSelf-expression can often be felt by others as disrespect.  Be careful to always read the room. \nI stopped worrying about what people thought of me when I realized how little they thought of me at all. \nI’ve only been a member of one ‘country club’… this one.  Club dues are taxes and public service.  Until recently\, I always paid my dues gladly. \nI was never religious\, but I’ve always been Christian… and Muslim and Jewish and Hindu and Buddhist and Pagan and… \nWe’re all in this together.  Matthew 25:35-40 is the only rationale I need\, to explain why all of us are here. \nThe more I’ve acknowledged my defects\, the more benign and sympathetic I’ve been toward the defects of others. \nI abhor those who salute the stupid as patriots\, and diminish the worth of intelligence and competence. \nExcellence is the process of making fewer and less obvious mistakes. \nI strive only to be trustworthy\, not trusted.  Trust is delicate\, and lives in the mind of the other. \nI am a dog person.  Dogs know this. \nIf it’s urgent\, I do it now!  If it’s important\, I do it next.  Unless I’m procrastinating. \nHate causes pain.  It never heals it. \nIn this country\, too many people treat politics as either a sport (mostly football) or a religion. It is neither.  It is far\, far more important.  \nI’m an addict.  When I do something beneficial for someone\, I get an opioid high. (Naturally\, from endorphins.)   \nMy generosity enhances my vitality with little effort on my part. When I give\, it feels like an essential and natural part of being alive. \nStinginess is exhausting. It promotes a sense of scarcity and makes generosity seem like a sacrifice. \nIf we had taken seriously any one of three women\, we wouldn’t be in this mess.  Hillary Clinton\, Liz Cheney and Kamala Harris all warned us. \nI am an introvert.  I’m not anti-social.  I’m simply pro-quiet. \nMy best partners held my interests as theirs. They shared in my successes\, and delighted in our mutual good fortune. \nJoy touches the eternal.  It connects us with the cosmos\, as well as with the subconscious. \nBirds are brilliant mathematicians.  To go from 30 MPH to zero in an instant and grab a thin branch\, requires some serious real-time calculus. \nCertainty is not a virtue. Speaking assertively is not a proxy for thinking deeply. \nRefusing to accept opinions as facts is key to my maintaining common sense. \nI’ve learned to be careful when reading between the lines. Most of the time\, I was just guessing. \nThe most important reason for me to treat others with respect is not what I get in return.  It’s who I’ve become as a result. \nI treat my opinions like worn clothes. Some I’m comfortable with\, the rest I need to get rid of. \nSometimes\, my walking away from a losing effort was not a failure of conviction. It was a triumph of wisdom. \nThanks to a proctor in my military training\, I learned that the best way to prove myself was to im-prove myself. \nA healthy disagreement isn’t about me being right. It’s about both of us feeling understood. \nI can dislike someone without disrespecting him.  It’s simply an exercise in mature judgment. \nKey to my integrity is adherence to principle. I will oppose anyone who challenges my ethics or threatens my responsibilities. \nTake care of your teeth and your feet.  They take a beating\, and you’ll need them your entire life. \nAn employer\, a company\, a business… is not a family.  Families forgive.  Families love. \nHesitation is inconclusive. A decision is clearest when it’s either “Hell yes!” or “Hell no!”. \nI’ve never been defeated.  Either I won\, or I learned. \nWhen you’re dead\, you don’t know you’re dead.  All the pain is felt by others.  The same thing happens when you’re stupid. \nIn the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king.  Beware the one-eyed man. \nFailing is simply part of learning.  On the other hand\, being a failure is a painful state of ignorance.  \nI happily accept both my virtues and my admitted flaws.  They’re my shield.  No one can use them against me. \nCannabis showed me that I’m blessed with a cosmic sense of humor.  Beneath it all\, everything is funny. \nAs my grandparents used to say: “Too soon old.  Too late smart.” \nI bow to all mothers.  If we males were the ones to give birth\, we’d be an extinct species. No male would go through pregnancy and childbirth a second time.  \nTrying to find time is a fool’s errand.  Making time is the key to a happy life. \nI have found that staying positive is my best chance of having things turn out the way I’d planned. \nThe current state of our politics:  One party is working to make government fail.  The other tries\, but fails\, to make government work. \nThere’s a thin line between insanity and genius.  Sometimes the difference is simply intention. \nGreed results from abuse in childhood\, leaving a craving for acceptance and satisfaction… that can never be fulfilled.  \nAlong the way\, I’ve had several long-term friendships with wise women. Each has been a great blessing to me. \nAs I’ve aged\, I’ve come to appreciate what my ancestors had.  My younger self could only see what they didn’t have. \nA lie would make no sense\, unless the liar could make a profit… or the truth would expose a crime. \nI’ve found that happiness usually takes the form of “me … now”\, where joy is the state of “us … always”. \n53 years ago\, I took part in an enjoyable conversation between a Democratic candidate for the Presidency\, and a Republican former governor of Oregon… in a time when politics was civil. \nAll those whom I love have at least one thing in common: they can make me laugh. \nIf I insist that my thoughts be consistent\, it means I’m as ignorant today as I was a year ago. \nWhen I was a kid growing up in New York\, I had no idea where―or even what―Oregon was.  And yet… here we all are! \nForgiveness can’t change what happened\, but it can influence what comes next. \nNo one can possess a billion dollars honestly or responsibly.  Billionaires are\, by definition\, sociopaths. \nYou may forget what I say.  After all\, it’s only words.  What’s important is how I’ve made you feel. \nOnly a fool thinks government should be run like a business.  Good government must do things that a profit-driven business cannot. \n“All cruelty springs from weakness.” — Seneca \nCourage is doing the right thing for the right reasons\, when consequences will be painful. \nCourage takes preparation.  No one is courageous without intention and forethought. \n“Courage is resistance to fear\, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.” ― Mark Twain \nMy beloved country suffers from attention deficit disorder.  What else\, beside ignorance of history\, could explain our re-electing a fascistic convict?  \nThe Romans had two words for love\, amo and curo.  Amo is loving passionately.  Curo means I care.  In the end\, curo wins. \nAn executive once told me the higher he climbed\, the more his decisions became just a crapshoot.  Often\, he was simply guessing… and anxious.  \nWealth is a misunderstood concept.  Unless you’re able to enjoy giving it away\, you do not possess it. \nBurying one’s head in the sand puts the family jewels in a vulnerable position. \nI took an oath to be loyal to this country\, to its Constitution… not to its government.  \nMy brother Tim showed me how to live with courage and humor\, and how to die with dignity. My longevity has been but a lengthy journey on his shoulders. \nBelieve me\, life was just fine before the Internet. \nI have witnessed more integrity in prisons than I have in politics. \nWhen my dad died\, there was no one left between me and the void.  That taught me to welcome all of life’s many blessings\, and to appreciate its inevitable finality. \nAnd still\, life goes on. \n  \n—Dick Willis \n* \n  \nRocky writes from “The Hole.” (He didn’t deserve to be there. Punishments in prison can be arbitrary at times. He’s out of “Segregation” now.) A year from now he’ll be out of prison entirely. Hallelujah! \n  \n4-11-25 \nFrom about 7:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in my little cell the sun comes in. It’s only a little sliver\, but I use it often to get a taste of sunshine. This morning I made my bed & it stirred up thousands of dust particles that I could see in the sun. \n  \nI always try to positively charge my environment with good energy & I was focusing on the dust particles that were attracted to each other. Some were locked together in love\, spinning in space. Others were floating all alone\, in my mind\, searching for another to be with\, while others were locked in a dance—not touching\, but turning round and round. \n  \nAt first it reminded me of the cosmic dance of stars & planets in the vastness of space…then I refocused my mind and the dust followed the same patterns as beautiful people! Love\, relationships\, the dance\, friends & even the settling down of all of it. “Dust in the Wind!” I was finally able to see the song! It only took me 50 years! L.O.L. \n  \nI love seeing the beauty in all the places in the world. If I can find the beauty in the hard places & the dark places\, when I get out\, all the beauty waiting out there…I know\, it’s not all beautiful…but I see with different eyes now. \n  \n—Love\, Rocky \n* \n  \nCarl told me this story on the phone. I asked him to write it down\, so it could be shared with others. \n  \nBrushstrokes in the Sky \n  \nIn midsummer of 1991\, shortly after turning 6\, my Grandmother Colleen and Great Aunt Sharon took my two sisters and me to live with our ailing Great Grandfather. The man who in our family was legend was fighting two types of cancer. I do not believe any of us as children knew what this meant\, outside of leaving our little village in the fjords of Alaska. \n  \nI sat on that flight dreaming of riding the wild countryside with my Papa\, like a scene from “The Man from Snowy River.” I had heard the giants of my life speak of him in awe\, fighting Nazis in the Alps\, a real life cowboy sheriff chasing bootleggers in Southern Oregon’s woods. I’d met him once before and he’d taught me to yodel. A thousand adventures floated through my little mind. The reality was even better. \n  \nMy Papa Hale had only ever loved one woman his whole life: Winnifred (Winnie) Morningstar. He’d built their home with his two hands. And another for their five daughters on the other side of their property. We’d walk deer trails through the endless woods around his home. The whole time I’d beg him for stories I’d heard that he refused to tell. Every night he would have tea and watch the sunset over the creek in front of his house. He seemed at peace in those fleeting moments. Like there was something Holy there. Which is\, and was\, surprising\, as his daughters slept in a trailer out front to keep “their Bible” and “Jesus talk” out of the house—where he said it belonged. Yet in those hours he spent sitting under an old willow out front\, watching the soft hues of the evening sky\, I heard him whisper a prayer of deeper love than I’ve ever known: “It’s beautiful tonight\, Winnie.” I asked him what he meant and he told me about his one true love. \n  \nMy Nanna Winnie was charged by the Creator to paint each sunset wherever her babies were to be found. It was her favorite subject matter in life. She’s often set up her easel and painted as the day faded\, and the mix of sherbet-like colors covered her canvas. His house was a shrine to her work. Charcoals of her girls in their garden or the nursery—that was her love and work. Pastels of wildlife and the home they’d made together since the Summer of ’33. He spoke of her gently\, like her memory was everything he carried. His church was the painting she left him each night when the universe gave him one small moment each evening. \n  \nAnd I believed! I saw her brushstrokes change the boring blue of the day to pinkish oranges and soft purple. In the years that followed\, I would stare off in awe of what this woman would paint for us…the few who knew this secret of our favor from the Creator. Even when I was alone in foster care\, I had my meeting with Nanna who loved me. I was not alone. \n  \nI believed until I was twelve years old…when three of my older sisters teased me enough that I let go. \n  \nNow\, at the end of my 39th year\, as Summer comes closer\, I still catch myself looking up and feeling thankful for the love of that tall tale\, for all the beautiful art my Great Grandma gave me. \n  \n—Carl Alsup
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-5-1-25/
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250420T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250420T170000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250416T025022Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250504T181801Z
UID:5528-1745161200-1745168400@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:¡Bibliophiles Unanimous!  4/20/25
DESCRIPTION:¡Beloved Bibliophiles! \n  \nOn Sunday\, April 20th\, at 3 pm (PDT)\, our theme is NOVELS!  \nWhat have you read recently? What are some of your all-time favorites? \n  \nHere’s the Zoom link: \n  \nhttps://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058 \n  \nI hope to see you there! \n  \npeace & love \n  \nJohnny
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/bibliophiles-unanimous-4-20-25/
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250419T173000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250419T190000
DTSTAMP:20260424T013651
CREATED:20250415T030024Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250416T175134Z
UID:5524-1745083800-1745089200@openroadpdx.com
SUMMARY:A Midsummer Night's Dream in Prison at Portland Panorama Film Festival  4/19/25
DESCRIPTION:  \n  \nA Midsummer Night’s Dream in Prison\, a film by Bushra Azzouz\, will screen at the Hollywood Theatre\, as part of the  Portland Panorama Film Festival\, on Saturday\, April 19th\, at 5:30 pm.
URL:https://openroadpdx.com/event/a-midsummer-nights-dream-in-prison-at-portland-panorama-film-festival-4-19-25/
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